Ghost Wolf
by first-beach
Summary: AU post-Eclipse; ignores Breaking Dawn. A story about two people who fell violently out of love, and then years later, fell back in again, in the strangest of circumstances. What would you do if you were given the chance to redeem yourself for the mistakes you made in your life? Art: Wolf sky spirit by Twilighthawktaini
1. Chapter 1 - It was like this

_A/N:_

 _My first piece of fanfiction ever, here we go._

 _It's a bit of a strange story, but I hope you enjoy it.  
_

 _I've changed some fundamental things._

 _In this world, Sam died in a fire during the training for the Newborn battle. As a team, Jacob and Leah got the pack through the rest of training and through the battle but the pack were falling apart a little, and Quil was killed by the newborns.  
Then, after the battle, all of the Cullens leave Forks, and take Bella with them (willingly). Sue moves in with Charlie and the two comfort one another. Jacob goes AWOL as in the books, but when he returns he gives up pack life entirely, stops phasing, and holes himself up in his garage. So the responsibilities of Alpha end up falling to Leah.  
I've significantly changed Sam and Leah's back story. I've basically invented a new one. So, that part is non-canon.  
I've also added a few (annoying) new characters._ _  
_

_Please feel free to call me out on timeline details that I have got wrong, I'm sure there will be many._

 _Lastly, 'Twilight' and everything to do with 'Twilight' belongs to the author Stephenie Meyer, and definitely not to me._

 _Thank you to the Quileute tribe - and I feel like I should thank them on behalf of Stephenie Meyer, also - for the use of your legends and traditions and your name._

* * *

 _There was a time,_

 _When I was so broken-hearted,_

 _Love wasn't much_

 _Of a friend of mine._

It was like this.

I was hit by a surge of fear and panic, and I knew it wasn't mine. Like a seething wave, it coursed through me. It bowled me over, and tore a million holes through my lumbering body. Some holes were in the shape of letters. They were E's and M's and Y's. Others were smiling black eyes and scarred skin, a soft body underneath me.

As I squirmed and whined on the ground, trying to regain control of myself, I saw the pack scamper towards me from the black corners of my eyes. And beneath Emily's terror, I felt these little pinpricks of dread and alarm. They must have been terrified. In the encroaching darkness they stamped and howled, but I could barely see their paws and thrashing tails. I had been completely disabled. Blinded.

Once I collected myself enough to move towards her – as fast as I could, with no word of explanation to anyone – the darkness flew away. In fact everything was brighter and clearer, almost fluorescent. It was like someone had spring cleaned my eyeballs. It was like I was on drugs. It didn't feel real.

My feet barely touched the ground. I wasn't running. I was being dragged by a flying rope and I could barely keep up.

I remember a siren wailing down my ears. In response, I put on a muscle-tearing spurt of speed. By then all I could feel of my own body was my legs pounding and my paws flying over the velvet mud below.

I suppose, because my legs were all that carried me towards her, they were all that mattered to the imprint. The rest of me had stopped. I wasn't even breathing. My lungs were expanded tight across my chest, frozen.

The unmistakable tang of smoke hooked onto my nostrils and dragged me faster. There were green hemlocks ahead of me but all I could see was the fire I knew rampaged through Emily's little red house.

She was on the end of the rope. She was pulling me towards her. Her signal was _Help Sam Help Sam Help Sam._

Oh God, Emily. I loved her so much. Emily, God, Emily.

It was like this. It was like the trees and the river and the peaty mud and the salty air and everything pumped through her and flowed into me in this great, red, throbbing, wrenching circuit. It was something I had no control over. It was something which terrified me. It terrified me from the moment I learned to think about it.

My heart sailed above me. It was a heaving mess, coating the hurtling rope in thick scarlet paint. As I ran through my hot drops of blood I felt like my heart was baptising me. Like it worshipped me.

And then, when the wet red clouds began to blind me, blood piling up in my eyes, I realised it was the other way round. I was a slave to a quivering lump of gore. And it wasn't baptising me. It was hailing me with thousands of scarlet bullets. A part of me wished they were silver.

When I broke through the tree line, the signal from Emily cut out. Her panic and terror tore out of me.

I prayed: not dead.

Not dead.

Crying people were gathered around the little red house. I cursed the fire engine which was only now trundling leisurely over the grass. Someone screamed as I hurtled towards my imprint. I was moving so fast now I probably didn't look like a wolf. I was probably no more than a streaking black shadow.

I burst into the red matchbox we called a home. My huge, brutish body shattered everything in its wake. I scrambled up the stairs, and the ceiling collapsed behind me. I knocked the walls and they began to fall down too. I knew the staircase was impassable now, blocked and smothered by burning wood.

It was all coming down around me.

The whole world was falling apart.

Emily was trapped in our tiny bedroom. I nudged the hot door open with my nose and was immediately hit by an eye-watering wall of smoke. She was lying on our bed, almost like she was sleeping peacefully. Her blankets gave her away. They were low grey clouds that coiled their fingers around her wrists and ankles. I didn't let myself think about how much she'd inhaled. She was breathing, that was all that mattered.

I paused a moment, to take in the cruel scars tugging at her skin. Seeing her lie there was like looking at her after I'd clawed her apart. She was trapped then, too. She couldn't escape. She just lay, paralysed, gazing at me. I could see her teeth grinding through the flaps of her cheek: a whole invisible world made visible.

A loud, deep crack rendered the air. I knew the beam of the ceiling above the kitchen had just fallen through. We had moments. With my teeth I gathered her clothes around the nape of her neck, and picked her up, pulling her over to the window. It wasn't far to fall; Emily's house was almost a bungalow. Everything was low ceilinged. Even so, I leaned out as far as I could, my hulking form shaking to remain still as I lowered her so her feet swung only half a metre above the ground. I jerked my head forwards when I let her go, so she landed a little way from the house. As she collapsed onto the grass I felt the fresh air push its way down her throat and into her lungs.

Quickly, I recoiled through the window. The air was so hot in our little room. I felt smoke throng around me in a suffocating mass. And all the ash and smoke and heat, I sort of welcomed it. It took my oxygen away kindly, with the comforting embrace of a pillow pressed over a baby's mouth. Half-blind as I was, it was almost like being surrounded by people. Grey figures looped their ghostly arms through mine like old friends. I fell into them.

Beneath me, the floor dropped an inch. My eyes streamed. My throat stung like I'd downed a pint of crushed glass. Somewhere far away, I heard Emily cough. I hoped.

The floor was melting. The walls were blistering, eating themselves up. You know, I was happy to see the box room open. I was happy that the trap was breaking. Despite the raging pain in my lungs, a heady sense of freedom elated my chest. Emily woke. She dragged oxygen towards her, desperately. The sigh of relief I breathed cut like a swallowed knife.

Her little red house groaned. The floor dropped away again, and then the ceiling fell through and collapsed on top of me. I was held.

Between the burning timbers, the last thing I saw was the night sky.

It was as boundless as I felt. Through my smoke blanket, the stars were smiling at me.

* * *

 _A/N: The quote at the beginning is from the smashing Aerosmith song, 'Cryin'.'_


	2. Chapter 2 - Leah

Eyes open slowly these days.

Mine. Don't know about anyone else's.

Used to be like, dawn peeked through my window, and I leapt out of bed. Scrambled downstairs. Sniffed fresh sun-glazed air.

Maybe it's cos the weather's changed.

Or where I sleep in the house.

Top bedroom used to be mine. Now I'm sleeping on the ground floor.

Mostly cos I _can_ sleep here.

No beat up guitar sprawled on the floor. No records snoozing on my bed. No thumbed textbooks. Most of all no fountain pen brought back from Nottingham.

Forget it. 

Here, morning greets you different. I'm at low level. So mist creeps through the cracks in my window.

And that was how my eyes opened. With grey mist fingers drifting over my body wiggling their way into my eyelashes.

There's warm water on my face. And rough hands circling underneath. I look at the sink I'm bent over. Count the cracks.

And the mirror is fogged up.

"Good morning," I say.

I'm listening to my voice.

Well, here's how it sounds: not like my voice.

Foggy mirror looks back at me. No "good morning" in return.

Now I'm washed, I dress.

And now, I sit at the kitchen table.

Eating cornflakes. If I have cereal, it's always cornflakes. Never anything else.

Looking around me, I feel the chairs and the table and the fridge stare back. We are all so silent. Only sound is the crunching from my teeth.

And staring and silent most of all is the blue wall opposite me.

Not blue like the sea. Blue like metal.

'Teal.'

Silence of the sea is forgiving and kind. The quiet of this teal is sniggering and smirky. Never understood why my mom liked that colour. Reminds me of the uniforms rich white kids wear to school. The sea is real. Teal is not real.

Lock clicks in the door.

Seth.

Seth has lost his grace now. Like me, his movements are slow and creaky. And _clumsy._ But not all the time. Mostly when he's like this. Exhausted from paddling his way through the swamp of his drug-drowned mind. And he's putting all his weezy effort into being still and quiet so I won't hear him.

Idiot.

Rise from my chair. Listen to Seth patter down the hall.

Something crashes to the floor. He mutters "shit"and picks it up again.

Fucking idiot _._

Does he think that just because my hinges are a little rusty, my wolf _senses_ don't work anymore?

Ha! Can't he see? We're all stuck like this forever!

Seth reaches the door to the kitchen. Sees me standing at the table staring and silent like I'm one of the cabinets. His bones shudder with shock and he scrambles back.

"Shit, Leah! Do you have to do that? Shit!" he moans. Grapples with the door frame to keep from falling.

Give me two seconds, and I'm in front of him. Hold his arm to steady him. Now he's upright. And looking at me all nervous. Like from under his eyelids. Like he's a shop-lifting teenager and I am the police and he is all scared of what I might do.

Why does he look at me like that?

Feel my fingers dig into his crispy cheeks. Dig hard. Hard so his brittle teeth are shivering.

I glare into his eyes and can't bare their yellow. Everything about my little brother is yellow and grey now. Down to the colour of his thick reeking breath.

And when he phases, his wolf looks like a stray dog. All scabby. Ribs jutting out.

And he scampers around with his tail between his legs. Often cowers, crouches, looking up at you from under his eyelids. Like he's doing to me now.

"You coming to the pack meeting?" I ask him. He looks away. Says, "No."

"I want everyone there," I say. "It's important. It's important you give a good example."

Seth just stares at the kitchen table. You would have thought it was doing a striptease for him.

I expected as much. Little bro hates phasing now. Hates being part of the pack. Young cubs tease him or think bad thoughts, and then he can feel different bad thoughts leaking from Paul and Jared. And me. Not from Embry. Embry isn't ever thinking about much at all.

But.

Just cos I expected it, does not mean I'm not angry.

Seth's jaw is still gripped in my fingers. I push it away from me, rough, and feel one of his plaster-teeth crack. Rubs his jaw as it heals.

No injuries matter. In fact nothing matters.

"You're going down the same road as Jacob Black." I tell him. "Worse."

I want to spit. So I leave.

My cornflakes still on the table. Me, still wearing whatever the fuck I slept in. Glad it was something, 'cos I would have walked out naked if I had to. Anything to not spend another minute in the same space as my little brother. Anything to not have to look at him. His papery, lined skin. His lips drawn tight over his yellow teeth. His lank hair. And his wrists, with only their thin layer of veiny skin, wrapped tight over the bone. 

So now I'm walking. Pounding.

Now, I'm running.

My bare feet squelch over rain soaked earth. I pass rusty cars and sagging houses. So many of them are red, like Emily's. Deep drops of blood mixing with the water misting the air.

I enter the tree line. The soft canopy shelters me. Trees whisper. It's muffled, quiet, nice. Uphill, now. Conifer leaves, orange with death, crunch. Pine cones break under the soles of my bare feet. Earth, soft. Red bark. Uphill. I pause. Carefully and slowly _,_ I take off my clothes and fold them up. Turns out I slept in my dad's old sweatpants and my mother's old shirt. She used to garden in this thing. It's torn up and torn through with holes.

I stoop at the waist. Tie the clothes to my ankle with the band that's always there. Straighten up.

And then, she leaps out of me.

One second, I'm me. Leah. The next, I'm her. The wolf.

Immediately, voices drift across my mind, behind my eyes.

I blink a few times.

Wolf's sight turned kind of cloudy over the past few months. Now it's like a drop of milk is swirling around her eyes. Mixing and curdling, with all my tears and things.

I pad onwards.

 _Where_ is _she? Damn, I could have spent an extra twenty minutes in that chick's bed!_

 _One minute,_ I say.

Voices hush. Reminds me of jittery school kids, telling each other to shut up in assembly.

Few moments pass. And then, trees jump out my way and I emerge into the clearing where I told them to meet.

Five wolves wait for me. Two gambol together between the trees. Wes and Henry. Our latest recruits.

Seems like I really am the first and final female Quileute to phase.

Paul barks. Irritably. As usual. And directed towards the cubs. As usual.

Some kind of attention surfaces from the pack. Wes and Henry stop play fighting. Jared and Embry open their eyes.

I called this meeting because it was important.

Listen:

 _Been seven months since the Cullens left town._

That's my opening. Everyone just kind of listens like yeah, we know.

I go on. _However, the phasings haven't stopped. Like we maybe hoped. Sure, it happens less often. But it looks like the wolves are here to stay. I guess the absence of one particular coven doesn't eradicate the threat of the Cold Ones to our lands._

And here comes the juicy bit.

 _As long as these nomadic leeches keep passing through, we'll keep phasing to rip them apart._

In my head I hear Wes whoop. Yeah I'm kinda happy to get some kinda reaction. But I silence him anyway with my stone eyeballs.

Then I say, _For this reason, we're going to continue patrols interminably._

Interminably. Good word.

And pretty certainly I feel the cub's support drop away.

 _I want dedication and motivation from all of you. I want you all to contribute. I want you all to think like a pack, not like individuals. No fucking complaining. And always be ready to report._

That was my Alpha voice. Doesn't sound like me either. Jeez, in what universe would I create the sentence, _The threat of the cold ones to our lands?_

Sound like Old Quil. Never a good sign.

 _All sounds fine to me, boss,_ a tired voice intones in my mind. _Can we go home now?_

 _Jared,_ I say. _Good of you to show up for once._

Silly boy barely leaves Kim's house these days. Gross, because you can see the dopey love dilating his pupils, even when he's not with her.

Suppose some of that sentiment drifts out my Alpha shield and into the pack mind, cos Jared flops his head and gives me his best goofy doggy grin, rolling his eyes, tongue flopping out.

There's a kind of warmth I can't describe. It's a warmth comes from sharing everything with someone, even if you weren't friends at the time. Feels different to friendship.

 _Excuse me, I have a question._

This voice is snide and reminds me of a weasel. It's Henry. He's standing behind Wes' shoulder a little.

 _Yes?_

 _How come you're telling us to be always ready to report, but you can't get your own brother to turn up?_

He and Wes snigger in my mind.

Between my ears. Behind my eyes.

Henry is the colour of pale fish. But Wes' coat burns orange, and, in fact, when the kid shapeshifts he looks less like a wolf than a fox, to me. He's the smallest wolf here. Slight. But he's wily. And he has a look of cunning in his little darting eyes.

 _Shut the fuck up, Henry._

That was Paul. He's glowering at the pair of pups from the opposite side of the clearing. Eyes narrowed, muscles all bunched up, one paw in front of the other.

I look at Jared and Embry. Neither of them has moved from their positions lying on the ground. Jared is still a coffee stain mixing with the leaves on the earth, and Embry is a darker smudge, curled up tight as far away as he can be from everyone else in the clearing. Two eyes peek out of dusty fur.

 _What? What? I'm just saying!_ Henry's giggle rattles around my mind. Paul winces, and I know it's clattering on the underside of his eyeballs too. _It's a perfectly valid observation!_

However perfectly valid his observation might be, Henry backs away and backs away. Shields himself almost totally behind his little fox friend.

 _Henry,_ I begin evenly, _I'm doing my best with Seth. He hopes to be able to join all of you someday soon. In the meantime, I don't know, maybe you could even try to do something to help? Maybe talk to him? Is that a completely insane idea?_

Henry and Wes scoff again.

 _Whatever you say, grandma!_ Henry chortles.

Paul snarls. Sounds like a really pissed-off wolf.

For a moment, I see myself through Henry's eyes. Takes me a breath to realise who I'm looking at.

Is that my wolf?

No.

Not my wolf.

Not my voice.

Not me.

But it is. It's her.

And she does –

I do. Me.

I do look like a grandma. Look small. Thin and weak and hunched up.

From the back of my mind, Jacob Black strolls forwards. Big folded arms and husky voice announce me. _That's Leah. The silver wolf._

In the meadow where he introduced the pack to Bella, I remember thinking, I'm not going to parade around like a show pony.

Darted round the back of the meadow. Then, bound up all sudden and snapped my jaws at Bella real quick. Pale moon of her face disappeared behind Jacob's red rage. But I swear her eyes had lit up. Laughed.

My fur used to be sharp enough to cut you like a dagger. Made of a million mirror-shards. Now white clouds have drifted through it. My edges are foggy and unclear.

And from the fur out poke these nervous eyes. _Nervous_. And bleeding milk.

Used to be silver. Now I'm a white wolf.

 _Henry, you retard._ Wes' words are carefully measured out, his hidden laugh tugging them up snidely. _Leah can't possibly be a grandmother yet. She's not even a mother._

My abdomen caves. One by one, his words pummel into me.

So that leaked out, huh?

Or did it? Is this just coincidence?

Well. Whether the kid intended it or not, now I'm using all my strength to keep my legs standing.

This time Jared and Embry do stir. Embry bares his teeth. Jared's jaw snaps.

And Paul.

He bounds across the clearing. Rips Wes from the earth by the scruff of his neck. Hurls him into the unyielding trunk of Jared's cedar. About twenty yards away. I wince hearing two of Wes' ribs break. Jared scrambles out of the way as the fox-wolf's little body thuds back to the earth.

Peering through this pain-haze I notice Paul's wolf is a lot like mine. He looks older too. White and gnarled. While one year passed for everyone we know, have we both aged twenty? Thick wires shoot through his fur. Over his eyebrows. Looks like an elder. And his paws and legs, they're twisted wires. And his knobbly snout sprouts frazzled whiskers.

Henry rolls around on the floor weak with laughter cos his friend is spluttering and struggling to get up.

Paul raises a paw, and Wes cowers like –

Well. Like a baby.

 _Come on, Paul. Stop it._

Weak command. But he listens to me. Lowers his knotted front leg.

Me, I take a deep, grounding breath.

 _Patrols in pairs, every morning and evening._

I feel this heave of reluctance and irritation from everybody.

 _Not forever. We'll see how we go. This week, Paul go with Embry, Jared with Wes, Henry with me. Paul and Embry, you start tomorrow morning. We'll continue in that order._

Nobody speaks.

So I say, _You're free to go._

Now I'm turning and getting out of there as quickly as possible.

Trees welcome me with open arms and close themselves behind me.

I love trees.

Within moments, though, I'm no longer alone. I hear claws clicking and scrabbling over the ground behind me, and Paul's voice –

 _Leah, wait._

I do wait, but only because I know he isn't going to question me or tell me things.

He reaches me, skidding on the mud, and takes a few breaths.

We pad together in silence for a while.

And then I feel it.

Eyes on my back.

 _Again._

It's the third time this week.

And I'm angry. I'm angry someone faceless is watching us.

Wheeling around. Scanning the trees desperately for any sign of movement. Because I'm sure of it. I am sure someone is there.

A hunter?

Wild animal department?

Major league pest control?

No. It cannot be any of those things. Faceless man has watched me for months. I would have been shot by now.

In the trees far to my right, shadow shifts. I twist to find it. I see nothing. I sniff the air and I smell nothing.

 _Leah?_

Paul. His voice is wary and uncertain. Can't read my thoughts. But I bet he can feel paranoia rolling off me in waves.

 _What is it? Why have we stopped?_

As he speaks the eyes creep off my back. I feel the faceless watcher melt away.

 _Nothing,_ I say.

Pad past Paul's silent watching body. He follows.

As we walk I wait for him to stop eyeing me all concernedly. Eventually he does. And he's just Paul again.

Watch our white paws pass over the brown earth. Green leaves fall to bless our footsteps.

I wish that feeling would stop haunting me. Wish I could find the owner of those eyes and tear them out of their face. Wish most of all that the feeling is real and I'm not just losing my mind and imagining things.

About the time Paul usually veers off to head home, he stops.

So I stop too. We sit on the soft earth facing each other.

 _You're doing fine,_ he tells me. His eyes are softer now. Yellow and melty. Fix onto mine with strength, and I believe him. How does butter hold onto milk like that?

 _I think you're right to continue patrols. At least for now, until we figure all this pack stuff out._ I nod again. Paul sighs deeply. An old man grumble rumbling through his throat.

 _We need Sam, don't we?_ he says.

I recognise that voice. If he wasn't phased his head would be shaking and his fists balling .

He says, _I was so shitty to him all the time. Ungrateful. I have no idea how he did it. Any of it._

 _Yeah._

And that was me. 

After Paul leaves, I follow the path takes me to Emily's little red house. I know she will be in because she never leaves.

They fixed up her house pretty good. Mostly cos she refused to move out.

Nearly out the forest, I phase and get dressed. As I break out the tree line and walk into the cloud-soaked air, I remember the ugly shock of seeing her black charred roof letting damp smoke into the air the first week after the fire. Ugly shock wouldn't go away. No matter how many times I saw the house-corpse.

Now the tiny house I come towards is as red and warm as it used to be. Back when it was constantly ransacked by a hoard of laughing boys and me, scowling in the corner. I'm sad sometimes I wasn't happier then. To be with all those laughing faces.

Hear Emily's voice coming from the back of her house, so I walk round to the garden. She's there.

First her back comes into view, cut in two by the oily river of her thick black hair. She's crouching on the grass. Arms held in the air above her. Flying up and down like she's a string puppet. Coming further round, I see two little hands held in hers. I see the little boy in front of her, bouncing up and down.

His wide smile has one tooth in it. Right in the middle. His eyes are light brown, big and crinkling. One lick of black hair on his soft brown head.

When he spots me, he begins to bounce up and down even more and claps his hands. Gurgling laughter bubbles from his soft little neck. Eyes crinkle up til they're just sunlight slits in his shining face.

Emily turns. One of her eyes crinkles too. She's smiling. And he's laughing.

"Leah," she says. Voice is warm as a hug.

And her skin is warm. And her son is warm, too.

He runs towards me as I let myself in through the gate. He shouts Leah Leah Leah!

Leah? I think. She's not here. This is just a shell.

I scoop the little boy up in my arms and whirl him around. Truth be told, he makes me feel as young as I am. Sometimes he even makes my old self creep back. She hooks her hands onto the back of my eyelids and hauls herself up to peek out my pupils.

I lower the little boy from the air and hold him in my arms. Bounce bounce bounce.

Smell that special smell only babies have. Clean and powdery and sweet. Makes you want to curl up in a ball and cry.

"Hello, Sam," I say, stroking his cheek. Feels like satin.

Sam gurgles contentedly and snuggles into me. We walk over to Emily. Sam starts beating his fists lightly on my arms. So I let him down and he runs into the little red house.

Emily laughs.

He's gone to get me something.

Anyone who visits here, no matter who they are, they get a present. Pressed on you by Sam.

"How have you been, Leah?" Emily asks.

I sit down beside her and tell her about the pack meeting today that was not so successful. She listens real close. Then she shakes her head and shuts her eyes.

"Sam would have known what to do," she sighs.

I know she's not talking about her little boy.

She's talking about the bigger boy. One who left us all nearly one year ago. And frustration sparks inside me, because Sam is the reason we're in this mess in the first place.

I don't mean it.

I'm bitter.

And I'm doing my best. But all anyone ever thinks about is their old Alpha. Never me.

And I'm a little

I'm a little lost.

Sam patters out of the house. On the last tiny step he falls flat on his face in the grass. But he does not cry. Just pushes himself up to continue on his teetering path. He is the only toddler I have ever seen do that.

He wobbles to my side and holds out his tiny fist. Inside, there is a little pebble. Emily laughs again.

"Looks like he just scooped up some gravel from the pot plant. What a lovely present, Sam!"

I laugh too. Hold his hand. "Thank you, little one," I say. Nuzzle his cheek with my nose. Feel little fingers hook round my ears. Tug on my hair slightly. 

When I'm walking home, trees along the road start rustling.

I stop and peer into them.

Almost like the trees lean forwards towards me.

And from the trees, I can feel those buried eyes. Reaching out.

I shiver.

Turn away.

Feeling claws me. Claws at my shoulders and wills me to turn back.

Feeling follows me the whole way home.

I'm watched through the window when I check on Seth. He's out like a light, thrown over his bed in the filthy clothes he wore this morning.

Only when I close the blinds on my own window does the feeling go away. Only then can I fall asleep.

"Goodnight," I say.

Room stays silent.


	3. Chapter 3 - Sam's dream

_Thy best of rest is sleep,_

 _And that thou oft provok'st; yet grossly fear'st_

 _Thy death, which is no more._

\- ' _Measure for Measure,' William Shakespeare._

I remember the night I dreamt about the cold.

It was the night of the day of Harry's funeral.

I was in the Arctic tundra, surrounded by vast expanses of white earth.

I shivered violently. The air was a thick, impenetrable violet. As I tried to push through it, my arm wavered in front of me. I could barely see.

The ground threw snow into the air. It swirled through the purple like wedding confetti, or dragon's smoke. My brain was as foggy and as frozen as the sky.

I didn't know what to do.

But I knew what I didn't want to do.

I didn't want to be scared.

I wouldn't let myself.

Somewhere, far off in the lilac sky, I heard Mr Krebs' dry old voice.

"Thy best of rest is sleep, Sam," he croaked.

I curled up on the ground, tucked my chin between my knees and wrapped my arms around my head.

I was one smudge of brown in a vast sea of white. But my mark was quickly disappearing. The snow was building up on top of me, making me an icy blanket. I snuggled down underneath it.

The thought that I might die here drifted across my dream in a peaceful way, and as the cold seeped into my bones, I smiled sleepily, waiting patiently for it to reach my heart and take me away.

But then I heard a faint, mournful howling.

I can't describe what it was like to hear. All I can say is I hadn't known misery could sound so beautiful. It was unbearable, but somehow as compelling as a siren's call. At once, I wanted to curl up tighter and cry myself to sleep, and wrestle my way out of the snow to go and help whatever was making that noise.

A wolf, I thought. But wolves don't feel that kind of pain.

A grey wolf ran ahead of me in the forest. We ducked under branches and rolled together.

And in the ice, the howling grew louder – like it was calling me.

A warm gaze fixed on my back as my arm pushed wet vines out of our way.

Under the snow I forced my eyes open. I began to dig myself out.

It seemed like the more I dug, the more the snow packed on top of me, until all I could see was a diamond of light in the far distance. I stretched my hands out, desperate to reach it. By now the howling had filled my ears. I needed to help whoever was making that sound. I needed to… I needed to… I cried out.

And then I was lying flat on my back. There was a woman's head on my chest. The rest of her body was stretched out by my side.

"Sam?" she asked blearily.

It was Emily.

My heart slowed its pounding, my breathing calmed. It was just a dream. I breathed out softly and kissed the top of Emily's head.

"I'm fine," I said.

She sighed contentedly and nuzzled into me.

When I closed my eyes, I saw Harry. So I had to keep my eyes open.

In the dark, all the meandering cracks of the ceiling and the damp patches where it met the wall were blanked out. A part of my mind enjoyed gazing at the plaster overhead in the dark, because I could imagine it was pristine and good as new.

But then I began thinking too much about the room I slept in, and I had trouble breathing. That happened a lot. The room was no more than a tiny box. At night the damp walls crept up on us, hemming us into a tighter and tighter space.

When I first moved in with Emily, the tightness of the house was what I loved most. Funny how much I came to hate it.

I sighed. I tried to calm myself down by focussing on Emily, trying to tune myself to the steady ins and outs of her lungs, the soft whistle she blew between her teeth. My eyelids fell shut.

And there was Harry.

I clenched up my face.

Couldn't he leave me alone?

He was trying to catch my attention, to tell me something, but I was too wrapped up in his daughter. I remember that day. Harry had embarked on an endeavour to get me into the football; you know, explaining moves, naming players. He kept glancing surreptitiously from the TV screen to me, and every time someone scored a goal he would look over hopefully. But I was never watching. Come on, how could I? I was sitting next to you.

Just as I decided any attempt to sleep was useless, a drawn-out and heart-wrenching howl broke into our little room.

I froze: the howling had been real. It had called me out of my dream.

"It's been going on for a little while," Emily murmured. I stroked her shoulder. She whispered, "Is it Leah?"

I nodded. Emily sighed. It was a small, sad, weary noise. She shuffled so she was almost completely on top of me, her leg wrapped around my waist, her arm around my neck. She buried her head into my throat and held me. After a while, her breathing resumed its sleeping-pace. Outside, the howling continued.

It was almost as if you were trying to sing – horrifically out of tune, your voice cracking like an old man's. It was the best thing I ever heard.

I wanted you to sing me to sleep like you had done before. But sleep still wouldn't come. So I lay awake and listened.

My eyes were straight ahead, unseeing. Emily was almost suffocating me. Your broken voice was tearing at me.

I can't remember how long it took to realise my face and pillow were wet and salty.

I blinked.

Carefully, I pushed Emily off me. She muttered something unconsciously and rolled over. I walked over to our window, and opened it gingerly. The fresh air was a blessing in that stuffy room. As soon as I smelt the pine needles and damp earth, my chest loosened.

You howled one more time. It was like a little greeting.

I smiled slightly and leaned out the window. I scanned the tree line, staring so hard, like I thought my eyes could rummage around between the branches and leaves. I was trying to find you. I could feel you. You were out there looking at me. I wanted to look back.

I realised I was waiting for something. I realised silence was filling up the space between us. The howling had stopped and wasn't resuming. I kept waiting. The longer I waited, the more I wanted to hear your voice again, and see you. But you were gone. I could feel it.

I stayed at the window, breathing in the night air.

Enough time had passed for me to think about heading back to bed when you howled for the last time. It came from further west. A song to the moon, not so mournful now: it didn't claw out my heart but spread through it with a comforting resonance.

West is where your house is.

It was like when I used to make you call me to say you'd got home safe.

Do you remember any of this? It's like my mind has blown it all up in Technicolor. All my memories of you.


	4. Chapter 4 - Don't Panic

_You're just a small bump unknown, you'll grow into your skin,  
with a smile like hers, and a dimple beneath your chin.  
Fingernails the size of a half-grain of rice  
And eyelids closed to be soon opened wide,  
A small bump, in four months you'll open your eyes._

 _\- 'Small Bump,' Ed Sheeran_

Why can't Seth just eat something?

I cooked him bacon and eggs! In the name of Steven Tyler's wig, what more can I do?

He does not do more than pick at it.

Now he's put his fork down. Staring into his orange juice like its depths hold the prophecy of our tribe.

And I stare at him. From across the table. From above my empty grease-washed plate.

"Seth," I say.

"Seth. Seth. Seth. Seth. Seth," I say.

"What. What. What. What. _What?"_

His eyes finally rise to meet mine. Looked like it took Herculean levels of strength. But as much as I hate myself for it, I cannot hold that gaze. Nope. Cannot. It's too –

Hm.

Well.

It's too dead.

"Have you got any plans for today?" I ask him, as I stand and clear away my plate.

I wait. Sip my coffee.

Silence.

Until, by the sink, I hear a small, "No."

Warm water runs over my plate. Washes it clean. Me, I turn and lean against the counter, still dirty. With folded arms, I look at the back of Seth's neck. But the yellowed spotted skin between his shirt and his thin hair holds no answers I can read.

Did not think it would hit him so hard. None of us did.

And I suppose it makes you realise how little you _know_ , really know, about people.

There was a fellow who used to live over the road from us. An old dude. Old for around here anyway. He was probably around fifty five. Dude was called Eric and he used to grow apples. And he would bring round a bag of apples every month or so, and in exchange Mom would bring him herbs and spices she grew in her little gardening patch. And then when I was about thirteen I watched four police cars park outside Eric's house as I stepped outside to walk to school. Turned out he was caught up in a meth ring.

And in some sort of a similar way, I had been completely oblivious to all the blackness and blankness that had been piling itself up inside my little brother. Not until it was too late.

And who would have known that it would be Sam's death to make it all explode in a gooey, sticky, ugly mess?

Well. I suppose I should have known. After all, that seems like the kind of thing big sisters know about little brothers.

But I hadn't realised how much Sam had meant to Seth. How much he missed him even before he died.

Sam's death hurt everyone. But it killed my little brother.

Now he's clawing his way through an ocean of black gloop every day. Drowning in it. Me, I'm squatting on the shore. Trying to reach out a fishing line or something for him to hold onto so I can pull him inland. But Seth just keeps on flailing. And I cannot throw far enough.

Fried breakfasts. As if that's going to cut it.

Sudden anger tugs at my arm and before I know it my coffee mug is thrown across the room. It crashes into a picture I once took. It was of the forest outside our house at dawn. Dad put it in a frame. The picture swings, and then falls to the floor.

Seth jumps.

He stares at me.

Then he stares at the picture, cracked and oozing coffee blood.

And then he stares back at me, and his hands grip the table like he thinks he's next.

Why does he think that?

I hurry to the spilt coffee with a tea towel.

"Sorry, sorry," I'm mumbling. Trying to scoop up the glass and china. All I do is cut my hand.

I swear. Loud.

Stand up. My back to him. Suck my hurt finger.

And then I sigh. Stand with my hands on my hips and my head drooping to the floor.

And then I walk out.

Cannot face him.

Try not to think about Seth staring after me. Confused eyes.

Shame rolls off me in thick panicked waves.

I do not know what's wrong with me.

I let my feet take me wherever. And tears blur my vision so I am blind as my wolf.

The only time I see Seth's eyes undeaden themselves is when I've done something to make him scared.

Us two, we're the shell siblings.

And me, I'm no use.

No use.

I should be able to help us. I'm older. Stronger. So why can't I?

My feet march in time. So it's no use, no use, no use.

And now they've taken me into the forest. And I'm climbing the steep trail which eventually finds the cliffs.

I climb like this for forever. Every time I step down I do it real hard so my feet mash into the earth. And I'm happy when a thick drumbeat starts to fill my ears. The noise is soothing. And the harsh rhythm is soothing. And I march on and on and on and on

Until I'm knocked over.

I'm lurching down a slope, steadying myself with outstretched branches, when a body brushes my legs and tiny feet patter right past me into the undergrowth.

I shout out in surprise. My knees jerk up cos I have this feeling like I'm going to step on whatever that was. And I end up tripping on a tree root and tumbling down

down

down

to the bottom of the slope.

Mushy leaves in my mouth. Grit in my eyes. I cough. Push myself up on my hands and knees.

And I start crawling round like a crazy person. Best I stay on this low level, because the thing was so small and far below me and I want to find it. Desperately sniffing the forest floor. Trying to catch that little thing's trail.

Two feet. I'm sure. It had two feet and one tiny body.

Sniff sniff sniff

Sniff. Sniff

Sniff

sniff

No scent.

Nothing.

It's gone as quick as it came. Long gone.

And I'm left with the empty forest.

I sigh. Deep. Like my grandma used to sigh.

With slow bones, tired bones, I rear off my hands and fall onto my back. I lie in the bed of this forest pit. Above me there is a circle of white sky. The tree leaves dance around it, so its edge is swirling. Leaves look black against the white light. It's pretty.

My eyes close.

And then, somewhere in the trees above me, I feel another pair of eyes open. Like they're tired and just woken up. And they widen and fix on me.

Suddenly, I'm tensed up.

But I resist the urge to look back.

Nah.

I will try to find them. Will not make a fool of myself anymore. Those eyes always stay hidden from me. So I will just lie here and maybe fall asleep with the leaves nestled close to my sides and the damp mossy breeze breathing softly on my neck.

But sleep evades me.

Something strange is going on.

Feels like the air has gone hot and buzzy.

Like there's

 _Energy_

Everywhere.

If I opened my eyes right now I would not be surprised to see a million fireflies swarming the sky over my head.

But I will _not_ open my eyes.

Don't open them. No. no. no.

But.

It's

It's like

Like the trees and the air and the bugs and the leaves and the moss and the wet soil are all creeping as far as they can towards me and

Little whispers burrow into my ears.

 _Open._

 _Open your eyes._

I squeeze my eyelids shut, shut, shut, and then, like a spring that's been pressed tight and let go, they fly apart.

Above me, way above, on the bank of this small valley, between the rusted trunks of two cedars, stands a black wolf. Its brown eyes bore into me.

I snap upwards like a mouse-trap. In the moment it takes to blink, the wolf has disappeared.

But it was there. I _swear_ it. And –

"HEY!" I shout.

Because I have just seen a pair of brown shoulders receding into the tree shadows.

Struggle to my feet.

Shout, "Hey!"

Shout, "Hey! HEY!"

Scaling the steep slope on the other side, scrambling, helped up by vines and branches, I keep shouting with everything my mouldy lungs can muster.

Stop. Stop. Wait. Stop. You creep. I'm going to find you.

Who are you? I know you.

Once out of the pit, I hear a twig snap to my right, and I run after the sound like a crazy woman.

Somehow I know where to go. Or at least I am going where it feels right. Like somebody laid out a path ahead of me and all I can do is follow it.

I realise I am still climbing.

And then I break out of a copse of trees and I find myself on a rocky outcrop. High up.

Higher than I have ever been before.

The sea, a swelling iron mass too far below.

And in front of me, those brown shoulders.

And short black hair.

And denim cut-offs. Like none of us have worn in nearly a year.

And he's turning now.

I see a straight nose throw its shadow onto the bright sky.

And then he's facing me. His brow is furrowed. And beneath it are his worried eyes.

Brown eyes. Big eyes. Soft, searching eyes.

I say, "Sam."


	5. Chapter 5 - Too little, too late

_A/N: Hallelujah! Fanfiction is back up and I can update. That said, I'm not massively happy with this chapter; but I changed it and changed it and there's nothing more I can really do. So now that I've really sold it to you, enjoy._

* * *

 _Anything to make you smile_

 _You are the ever-living ghost of what once was_

 _I never want to hear you say_

 _That you'd be better off_

 _Or you liked it that way_

 _But no one is ever gonna love you more than I do_

 _No one's gonna love you more than I do_

' _No-one's Gonna Love You,' Band of Horses_

I'm trying to place this feeling that's tingling through me. It's a weird, woozy feeling; like, something that was deeply grounded in my stomach and spine has floated away, and now the rest of me might follow it into the ozone at any moment.

The reason I'm contemplating this fairly irrelevant stuff is because I want to occupy my mind while waiting for Leah to speak. I don't want to freak her out so I'm keeping quiet; and very still and very un-alarming, anticipating her first move.

It's taking a while.

She's just standing there.

Everything but her hair is as still as ice. So black ribbons dance around her frozen eyes and the wind carries me the smell of her. When I breathe deeply, I'm sixteen again, and the girl opposite me is my entire world. In the morning I get out of bed for the light caught in her skin, and the way jokes teeter on her lips before she tells them, and the quiet laughter in her star-stained eyes.

But that isn't how Leah looks now.

Her lips are dry and chapped as she opens her mouth, and I tense up in expectation.

"You're alive," she says.

The two words take a while to form. She chews them up and dislodges them with difficulty. I suppose it can't feel right to say. Nor does it feel right to reply what I must.

"No," I say.

Her eyes grow wide and for a moment I see dead stars reappear in fierce supernovas. And then they harden into flat stone. She takes three strides forwards, pulls her right fist back, and swings for me with all her might.

The punch passes straight through my shoulder.

Leah stumbles, steadying herself after the absence of expected contact.

She looks up at me, her face cast in shock; and I watch as that mask falls away and gets replaced by one of horror, so her lovely mouth and nose and eyes are all twisted up. She backs away from me, her legs shaking. When she bumps into a tree, she turns on her heel and takes off into the forest.

I breathe her name, and take off after her.

The feeling of lightness chases me, threatening to liquefy my whole body so I'll drift away into nothing. I ignore it and run faster.

But I've lost her.

Under the dark green canopy of the forest, I pause, unsure which way to go.

Desperately I turn in circles, scanning every escape route.

All around me, with the aching movement of an old woman, trees and vines and leaves are beginning to stir.

No, I'm pretty sure I'm not imagining it.

Green and white motes of lichen are filling up the air and swirling round my head like fairies are real. All the trees seem to be leaning to the north-east. A damp vine strokes along my cheek and I follow its tender fingers, just in time to see white fur swallowed by the green. North-east.

I tear into my wolf and race after her.

God, why does it feel like my spine has been replaced by cotton wool?

Pretty quick I'm hot on Leah's tail, which feels strange because my wolf was a big, clumsy guy, always pretty slow through the forest. I remember how becoming the wolf used to feel like loading ten kilos of meat onto my back, and I always got so tired out having to constantly dodge round tree trunks. Now, the wolf seems to be having no trouble getting around the alders and the cottonwoods.

Oh.

He's not getting around them. He's going straight through them. He's just a shadow.

Him and I, we're nothing.

Leah's chant is _Not real not real not real._

I can feel the fear dripping from between the words, and my own chant starts up.

 _Leah, Leah, Leah, Leah…_

I wish you weren't afraid of me. I wish you'd stop running away from me.

Her name marches across the planes of my skull. It patters over my tongue. It drums on my eyeballs and picks at my brain.

Fear drips from my chant too, because she's not the only one who's scared. I'm afraid that she won't stop running away from me. I'm afraid I'll lose the only person who can hear and see me.

You know, it's like that thing about a tree in a forest. If it fell but there was nobody there to hear it, did it really make a sound?

Well, if I'm here and there's nobody to sense me, do I really exist?

What if I fade away again? What if I become invisible and mute like I was for all those months I watched Leah and willed her to see me?

Well, listen to me now. You.

Leah.

I won't stop running until you do.

It isn't exactly like I've got a better way to spend my time. And I have far too much of that, now. And it distracts me from this _light_ feeling.

But man, it's all way too reminiscent of the last time I chased you through this forest.

Do you remember?

It was the day Harry died. The day you first phased.

Our sadness mingled so we were both drowning in the double force. You do remember, right?

Perhaps you don't. You weren't exactly seeing straight at the time. You were as stricken and panicking as a cornered cub, screaming inside your own mind. You weren't thinking, only running.

I remembered the feeling from when I first phased. Running is all you can do. Your brain is too much of a fog for any coherent thoughts like, for example, _slow down a minute pal, and maybe you'll be able to work out what's going on here in a calm and rational manner._

You can't stop, because stopping means accepting. So you just keep running. Eyelids peeled back, eyeballs cartwheeling, muscles pumping, lungs clamped. And Leah if all you could do was run, all I could do was try to keep up.

And that was an impossible task! Yeah, you really gave me a run for my money. Once or twice I truly thought I was going to lose you. Barrelling around a colossal Sitka spruce, barely able to keep my eyes trained on your grey fur, I knew you had to be the fastest in the pack. Have you ever run that fast since?

Doesn't matter. You're still the fastest in the pack.

Something kept replaying in your mind. It was a two second sight of Harry.

I thought it might have been your last sight.

You were gazing at him laid out on the sofa, and then someone moved in front of you. It was one of Sue's friends. She had blocked your view.

But it was too late, right? Because you'd already seen his eyes, and there was no getting around that staring vacancy. So you knew that all the waiting around – for the ambulance, for the hospital, for the doctors – was pointless. He had gone. The memory blinded you, so it blinded me too. Harry's body was weighed down with its emptiness like someone had tied stones to his ankles; yet he flew above us.

I pushed away my own grief. I didn't listen to the voice telling me I hadn't spoken to Harry in months and now I would never hear his words of advice again, which were always like cool grey pebbles dropping into a hurried stream and making _sense_.

Was that the right thing to do? Ignoring my own sadness to let you drown in yours?

I thought I was being strong.

I don't know. I did a shitty job. I really was trying, but I know I did a shitty job.

I was remembering some of the things you used to say, and how they sounded touched by a timeless wisdom which I guessed you got from Harry. But most of the time you had your own thoughts, and they were yours unmistakeably. You see, I had already started weighing up what you might bring the pack: we needed a fresh way of thinking, and I figured we could get that from you. I was pleased.

At some point it did occur to me that perhaps you weren't the same Leah. I felt a stab of guilt and Sue's eyes on my back, following me through the grocery store. But I just pushed it away.

I'd got so good at doing that by then, it was easy. All I had to do was tell myself it was something to consider later, and that right now the goal was to catch up with you and calm you down.

To tell you the truth, Leah, I remembered you with bold, shining armour, and I didn't believe you could be broken until I saw it for myself.

And hurtling through the forest behind you, seeing what you were seeing, I thought about how inextricably and infinitely bound to one another we now were. I wondered how that might make you feel. I knew for sure you would hate it at first.

But considering how everyone hated the pack at first, and then came to love it, I was feeling kind of quietly confident you would be the same, and find your place.

I was wrong, of course. You never really came round. I never blamed you, either. I give myself some credit for that.

If I had been thinking straight, the way I did before I went all imprint crazed and Alpha loopy, I would have known your case would be different because I knew you were different to pretty much every other person on the rez.

I kept tripping over roots and misjudging jumps. I was distracted. Your confusion and pain was burning inside me.

I pushed away more thoughts: what would it be like to be the only girl in the pack? what would the wolf do to your body? how would you cope with the pack mind, when you found space for yourself so essential?

But as you led me through the green and red and under the iron sky; and I caught rare glimpses of silver and thought about how proud it made me that you could reach those speeds, I made a promise to myself.

I promised to look out for you and Seth, to look after you if I could. I promised to always put the pair of you first in my considerations of plans and treaties, negotiations and talks with the elders. I owed it to the both of you to prioritise your feelings and your interests after I had stamped all over them and left them on the side of the road.

I know. It was too little, too late.

I know, I know.

* * *

 _A/N: Call me out on stuff that makes zero sense.._


	6. Chapter 6 - Darting fish

_Lover, please do not_

 _Fall to your knees_

 _It's not_

 _Like I believe in_

 _Everlasting love_

 _\- 'Ghosts,' Laura Marling_

Just me, the trees, and my panting breaths.

Thunder in my ears.

Get away. Get away. Get as far away as possible. Get away.

Oh God. I can feel him right behind me. And there, in the corner of my eye, a smudge of deeper black on the darkness…

No. Do not look.

Look straight ahead. Look straight ahead and the shadows will go away.

And think:

And know:

Not real. Not real not real not real.

And think and know:

I'm dreaming.

I'm dreaming.

I'm dreaming.

"Leah!"

Shut _up!_ I'm trying to dream!

I'm dreaming I'm dreaming I'm dreaming.

But he keeps calling my name. And something is settling in my bones with ancient certainty. Something telling me this is not a dream. Because I cannot be hearing that voice. Yet there it is all the same.

And here I am. Running for my life.

I will not lie. I am scared shitless.

I finally look to my side and I see him and he has caught up with me. He…

He's just two brown eyes fastened on me in a fuzz of black smoke. And…

And he is not running for real.

He is flying. And he passes straight through the trees.

For the second time today I have fallen.

Dead log throws itself across my path. The scream I was about to scream is strangled in my throat as my old paws take too long to rise and are caught underneath this dead log.

I roll through the air right over it. Furry rainbow.

And I hit the earth with a back breaking crash.

My wolf rolls and rolls and rolls until me, I roll right out of her. And I keep rolling. And it never ends until eventually I ricochet to a halt, caught in a sprawling bed of cedar roots.

I am curled up and muddy and knee-hugging and shaking. Hurts and aches and stings begin to flower all over my body.

Twigs in my hair. Twigs up my ass.

And I feel him appear beside me. He is a little moving pocket of warmness.

Lift up my spinning head.

Hands buried deep in those denim cutoffs. Hidden face. Brown shoulders.

Sudden anger flares up. It is ridiculous, when only a moment ago I was too terrified to breathe. But come on. Even dead he's grossed out by the idea of me naked? I scramble to my feet.

"No need to turn away," I snarl. "Nothing you haven't seen before."

It is as if none of the past year has happened. As if Sam is still Alpha and I am still angry _all the time._

When Sam remains silent and unmoving I feel fear threaten to creep back. I do not let it. Pull on my sweatpants and t-shirt all angry. Because angry is better than being scared shitless, right? It is almost like being brave.

He is turning to face me.

Anger anger anger. Find your anger. Why is this difficult now? I never even used to try.

"What are you?"

Almost spit it in his eyes.

And why does he have to do that?

Why does he have to be

So much like

So much like

Sam.

Sad sloping Sam.

Eyes cast downwards.

And right when I'm thinking that I cannot take any more this, of people who used to love me staring at whatever to avoid my eyes, he looks up.

Pools of brown warmth. Little black shadows. And flecks of gold light like darting fish lit up by the sun.

Shrugs a little.

Says, "Lost."


	7. Chapter 7 - The Invisible Father

_"Wherever I sat – on the deck of a ship or at a street café in Paris or Bangkok – I would be sitting under the same glass bell jar, stewing in my own sour air."_

 _Sylvia Plath, 'The Bell Jar'_

We've walked down to the beach. I'm keeping my distance from Leah. You know, not saying too much, not moving too quick.

She keeps doing this thing where she rubs her eyes and blinks loads and then sneaks a glance at me sideways.

I feel bad. I want to make myself small so she can't see me so clearly.

But it feels so good to be seen.

And you know here, on the beach beside her, it even feels like touch and smell might be coming back to me. You see I don't just _know_ the stones are wet, I can actually feel it. Very faintly; a lick of saltwater from miles away, yet right there on the sole of my foot.

Leah's doing it again. Rubbing her eyes, and then filling them with clutching disappointment when she sees I'm still here and not back in her imagination where I guess I belong.

"Sorry," I say.

She flinches.

I forgot dead people don't speak.

"No," she replies. "This will just take some getting used to."

I nod. Oh, man, this weird _light_ feeling is really starting to bug me. I can't stand it. It's like my belly and back are filled with helium, everything ready to fly away.

Leah holds her hands at her sides in tight fists, and holds her body in a straight line, angled ever so slightly away from me. She's ready to run at any moment.

So I walk away from her, kind of stiffly, to a driftwood tree. It lies on the beach like it fell and broke its legs and could never stand up to leave; its bones stick out in jagged shards. I perch on the bleached skeleton and wait for Leah. She eyes me warily, but eventually fills the gap between us - much to my relief: I was beginning to think she would walk away and leave me stranded forever on the beach, like this dead tree. I always hated taking risks.

Leah sits beside me, and really, this is amazing: I can just about feel the warmth from her 43 degrees body. It's like being alive again! Maybe my senses are coming back to me. Maybe I'll become solid. Maybe I'll come back.

"Can I..." I tail off.

Leah's gazing at the ocean. It flexes its iron waves for her, and the ash clouds send down mists of rain.

"Can I try to explain?" I ask.

Leah shrugs. "You can try," she says. I get the impression she thinks she's dreaming, but has given up trying to wake.

I tell her everything.

I begin at the beginning, which was the worst part.

My mind came back to me. There's no other way to say it, really. Thoughts reappeared. I was conscious. I suppose it was like waking up, but without all the good stuff that usually comes with waking up, like sight and sound and touch and smell. The world was black, and all I could do was panic and think in the blackness. And then colours began to emerge from the dark like ink bleeding over a black canvas. Mostly, it was green, but there were strokes of brown and red and grey too. But even when I could see and hear completely, I still didn't know who I was. I was just a part of the forest.

I tell her about realising she could sense me; how when she was near me she would twist around and search the air and I knew she was looking for me. I tell her how the more she sensed me the more solid I became. I tell her how I came back to myself in bits and pieces, until today I found myself with a body that was real and visible.

For a long time I was in a cushioned cage, invisible and mute and senseless and bodiless. The air was thick and impenetrable, but she broke it; and to be seen and heard by her feels better than a million breaths of fresh air.

Leah has been listening in silence, unmoving down to her pricked ears.

"There's this feeling I have, which I didn't have when I was alive," I say. "I feel like I could float, but that scares me because then I could drift away."

Leah clears her throat. To the sea, she intones, "You won't float away, Sam."

I feel a twinge of annoyance. I don't know why she has to speak to me like that, all weird and distant and monotonous. I just want to have a normal conversation.

"It's strange because it feels distantly familiar. You know? Like when you see someone who you used to know back when you were a really little kid, and you barely even remember who _you_ were then, but you know this person. You know their face from somewhere. Another life."

I sound like an idiot. Leah sighs quietly.

I try again.

"I want to hear about everyone. How is everybody getting on?"

And her face does the worst thing: it falls and closes up. Now she's looking at the pebbles under her feet. But I pretend I don't see and push anyway, even though it hurts.

"New wolves?" I ask.

For a brief moment, she's haunted by her old smile.

"New idiots," she says.

I laugh.

We sit together: Leah, the skeleton tree, the sea, and me. I close my eyes and breathe in and out, because I can feel the musty air wafting out of my lungs, and the sea salt stings my nostrils fantastically.

"I've been here for so long," I say. "I don't know why. How do I leave? Am I here forever?"

She shakes her head in one quick sharp movement, and finally, she meets my eyes. I see the decision made behind them. Like, pow.

"Come on," she says, and shoots up. She holds out her hand to me, and then immediately withdraws it like she touched a hot iron. I act like I didn't see because it's too early to joke about this mess.

Gradually, as we walk away from the beach, my brief smell and taste of the ocean fades. As I exhale, my breath sticks around instead of fluttering away, and starts stuffing itself up around my mouth again.

I barely notice where Leah's taking me until we're standing outside the little red house.

I stop.

Emily.

I haven't even thought about her yet.

That can't be right, surely.

No, something isn't right.

"Come on," says Leah.

I can't.

I think I'm afraid. It's like manacles have grown up from the ground and snaked around my wrists, holding me in place. And it's so strange, Leah, because I used to always pause outside Emily's house, but it felt good. This feels horrible.

I used to stop just outside the tree line, and feel the eyes of the trees on my back. They had mild eyes; uncurious, after all their years. I stood and waited, and let the knowledge that I was about to see Emily fill me up like a solid gold balloon. It made me feel powerful, being able to stretch out the last moments of separation so reunion could be that much sweeter. To be honest, it was the only time I ever felt powerful. It was the only time I ever felt like I had some control.

I was always tired, and I always ached, because every time I thought about Emily, I swear my heart was wrenched out of my chest to float ahead of me; and I was always thinking about Emily so I was always running in a red rain storm, as my heart, suspended just out of reach, showered me in droplets of blood.

I liked resting here for a few moments. It was the best way to rest, knowing you were just about to hear and taste and feel the love of your life.

I was going to marry her, you know.

I remember the day I decided.

The terracotta pots had been warm on Emily's porch, after a rare bout of actual daylight during daytime in La Push. They had soaked up the sun and now they were like little warm suns of their own. Daffodils sprouted from the pots and waved at me. There were yellow roses swinging from their tin cans. I saw marigolds smiling, and poppies blushing; and sunshine petals carpeted the wooden boards like they were laying my way to Emily's door. When I passed some blank and silent pots, filled with empty mud, I wondered what she was growing. I wondered about everything to do with Emily.

I hope they included a paint job when they rebuilt her house. The crimson on her door was peeling horrifically. When I pushed it open, the paint fell away in dry scabs. And then Emily, too, when she rushed into my arms, felt like her copper skin was flaking off like maple bark.

I used to obsess over how breakable she was. I always got the sensation she was coming apart, every time I held her. I guess that's because I was holding her with the same arms that tore her open and felt hot blood rush over them, escaping while she couldn't.

Emily had been leaning against a kitchen cupboard, swaddled in a floury apron, flicking through a magazine while Jared and Paul messed around at her table, their mouths stuffed full of fresh-out-the-oven cake. The sweet smell of it had drifted around the kitchen and got all into Emily's hair. I leaned forwards to sniff it, trying to find her real scent, as she led me to the table and gave me my own slice.

"Rein it in, Sam!" Paul shouted, spraying crumbs all over Jared, who licked most of them up and then flicked the rest straight back at Paul. I looked on in mild disgust, shaking my head.

"Yeah, Sam," said Jared, picking a crumb out of his bellybutton. "I will not be an unwilling voyeur to your bizarre sexual fetishes."

I cuffed him round the ear.

"Quit heckling your almighty leader, pups."

"Oh, you did not just _pup_ me," said Paul, half-rising from his chair.

Emily plonked him back down with a firm hand.

"Eat your cake," she reprimanded, and I looked at her all gooey-eyed like as a kid I'd had my first wet dream over an all-American housewife of the '50s.

Jared was chuckling. I looked at him gooey-eyed too. I had so much love for these people, back then, Leah. I think it got kind of lost as the pack grew and went on. Seeing it kind of recalls the feeling. And even though I'm cringing at those abominable gooey eyes, it's nice. It's like remembering a fuzzy dream that left your stomach warm when you woke up.

"What do you think of this one, boys?" Emily asked.

She was back to leaning against the kitchen cupboard, and was holding up her magazine. It was splayed open, parading a white, diamante watch all over its glossy pages. Jared and Paul leaned forwards, apparently in deep scrutiny.

"Pretty," Paul remarked, sitting back in his chair.

"I liked the other one more," Jared said. "You know, the leather one from Patek Philippe. It was like something an explorer would wear!"

Paul snorted. Emily hummed and turned to the next page, absorbed by the magazine's promises.

"I didn't really like that one," she mused.

Jared yawned. It was a big, wolf yawn, with hands reaching for the sky, and his backbone cracking and popping. His hands flopped back onto the table and his head drooped down.

"Man, I'm tired," he muttered. "Girl lives next door to me keeps having these parties. I get back from patrol ready to comatose myself and I can't get a second of sleep 'cos of all that stupid loud music."

Paul threw back his head and chortled. Jared looked too tired to even be affronted.

"You are such a loser," Paul wheezed.

"Oh, shut up," said Jared, rubbing a hand over his eyes. "I just pray she doesn't have another one on Wednesday night. My science test is on Thursday."

Paul tried to hold it in, but more laughing spluttered out of his lips.

"Sorry, sorry," he gulped, wiping his eyes. He leaned over the table and patted Jared's arm. "Hey, you're always welcome, you know."

Jared's eyes widened. "You've been going to Jen's parties?"

Paul held his hands up, and Jared threw a bread roll in his smug face.

"You dick!" the poor guy shouted.

"Hey!" Paul replied. "If I'm invited, I'm invited. It's not like I'm going to say no, is it? Jen's hot."

Jared started grappling with Paul from across the table, who spluttered and tried to escape. They ended up chasing each other around the kitchen, Jared repeating, "You are such a dick," over and over.

Emily suddenly gasped, throwing a hand to her heart. Paul and Jared both froze, Paul's face looking up in concern from underneath Jared's arm; but me, like the complete brain-washed dunce I was, leapt to my feet and shot to her side. I seized her elbows and searched her face for what was wrong.

"Sam, Sam, I'm fine," she had to reassure me. "Sorry, baby. I just gasped because of this necklace."

"Oh," I said, and leant beside her on the kitchen cupboard.

I wasn't even the slightest bit embarrassed. I should have been.

I don't know. Stuff like that is bothering me now.

Emily held up a two dimensional pearl necklace.

"Is it not the most beautiful thing you've ever seen?" she breathed.

I perused the pearls, curious to see what she saw. I was always so keen to see out of her eyes, to understand and understand and understand her. But I couldn't. What were these flat white pearls compared to the radiant sunshine woman beaming there beside me?

I didn't get why she tortured herself with all this stuff we couldn't afford. I don't know, maybe it wasn't torture for her; maybe she was escaping. But it certainly tortured me to think I could never give her everything she wanted.

Paul threw Jared off.

"I like it too, Em," he said. "It's very… bridal."

Then the kid sauntered back to the table with the most self-satisfied smirk I've ever seen prance over his stupid little face.

Poor Emily had turned away from me. All I could see was the dead skin of one cheek, but I knew the other had bloomed in a furious blush. Warmth like the bread she baked had started spreading through my chest, and I was barely even trying to stop it.

Jared laughed, following Paul back to the table.

"Pearls?" he asked. "I'm not so sure. Surely you want something fancier for your wedding, Em?"

He just managed to duck out of the way of her magazine, rolled up and carving a harsh arc through the air.

Emily shook her hair out of her face; she was kind of flustered and there was flour smudged on her nose and she was making my heart ache.

"You know," she changed the subject, "Pearls are actually considered by many to be the most precious stone of all."

"Really?" either Jared or Paul asked. I don't remember. They were both twin dumbasses, as I told them often.

"It's because they take so long to form. So they're really rare."

Emily spoke in her informative tone, and I thought again about how she never found the time to start working as a nursery teacher, like she seemed to have forgotten she wanted.

"It's a little gross, actually. It begins with a little piece of grit, and a clam. Over years and years, the clam covers the grit in layers of mucus and saliva and whatever else, until, finally, you're left with a beautiful little pearl."

Her fingers graced that page adoringly.

Jared's brow furrowed. He tapped a pattern in the knotted wood of Emily's table, clearly thinking this new information over.

Paul snorted loudly. He hunched his shoulders and pulled a face which made him look uncannily like Old Quil in one of his trances.

"This is _my_ piece of grit!" he cried, sounding more than slightly deranged. "I shall cover it!"

There was a stunned paused.

I asked, "Was that…?"

"An impromptu impression of a clam?" Paul challenged. "Yes. Yes, it was."

Jared bent double with all his laughter. His shoulders were bouncing up and down and his eyes were streaming.

"What did you put in this cake, Emily?" he managed to wheeze. "Should I be worried?"

I couldn't help it, I was laughing too. Emily's body was shaking beside mine, and she was wiping her eyes, and her mouth was all unravelled from smiling so hard.

"I know how to give you guys a good time, that's all," she joked.

The thing was, she did help them. She probably didn't realise, but since Paul and Jared had started infesting her little house, about six tonnes of solid weights had been hauled off their shoulders. They were always laughing, the three of them.

The baked-bread warmth spread to my lips, loosening them into a smile. Emily glanced at me shyly, the first time since all the wedding jokes, and it did something to my heart, already weak from falling in and out of its cavity; tugged at it a little more. Her blush was still on her cheeks, and her hair was still messy and strewn with flour, and I knew then, even though I couldn't hope to afford it, I would buy her some pearls and I would ask her to marry me.

I was content, then, Leah. Granted, it was a brief spell of contentment. A few months later, Paul was back to being a miserable bastard, and Jared saw no further than Kim. As more and more rez kids found themselves with fangs and claws, and I bombarded everyone with my waves of stress, the time ran out for days like these. But while it lasted, the contentment was heavy and real.

I think it's because my desires were so simple, and relatively easy to fulfil. I wanted to be with Emily as much as possible, to look after her and live with her in the little red house; and I wanted to be a good Alpha for Jared and Paul.

In short I had a small mind, Leah. I think it shrunk since pushing you out.

You, you were just a distant memory – an occasional stab of guilt when Sue's eyes followed me through the grocery store; and I was left with a small mind, small ideas, and a small future.

"Sam, come on," you're saying now. "Be brave."

I realise my feet and arms have become unchained. I take a few tentative steps towards the little red house. My feet form a path around, better to see the garden where I know Emily used to like sitting. I reach the gate and lean on it, and wait.

A few moments pass before the back door opens. The person who opened it stays invisible, and I imagine Emily, one arm outstretched to hold open the door while she balances pots and pans in a steamed up kitchen.

I hear her voice. She says, "Five minutes, Sam, and then it's lunchtime." I start because for a moment I'm alive and she's talking to me.

But a little boy is running out of the door, his arms overflowing with toys: wooden steam engines and teddies and a whole building's worth of lego bricks.

And I'm dead.

I'm dead.

"Yes ma yes ma yes ma," streams constantly and gleefully from this tiny kid's mouth.

Suddenly the he trips and all the toys fly out in front of him and spew across the grass. I expect him to cry, like any toddler would. But he doesn't. He just calmly pushes himself back up to sitting. And then he starts to play with a toy train, making it fly around his head like it has wings.

I feel Leah arrive beside me. I turn to see her sniffing the air; eyelids drawn shut, eyelashes lengthening in shadows over her cheeks.

"Has the rain just been?" I ask.

She opens her eyes, surprised. "Yeah," she says.

I remember that. After the rain, the scent of mud and leaves sharpens in your nostrils, and everything smells alive.

"You can't?" Leah asks.

I shake my head. "Not anymore."

And then I point at him and try to stop my voice from breaking but I fail at that too.

"That's my son, isn't it?"

Leah nods. "He is."

I nod, too. Then, silently, I make my way through the fence and towards the child playing in the grass.

I crouch down beside him.

"Hey, kid," I say.

The train flies around us in circles.

I go on. "And how are you? Well done for looking after your mother. I'm proud of you. Is she getting on okay?"

He drops the train. It trips over his ear as it falls and then tumbles the rest of the way into his lap. He looks around, confused.

I grin and automatically pick it up. But of course, the train stays resolutely put, and my fingers fly through nothing until they hit one another.

I will them to be a solid part of the living world. I will the sense back into their tips. With all my might, I search for the feeling I had back on the beach, like smell and touch was crawling home to me. But when I try again, my fingers still pass straight through the train.

So here we are: an invisible father, an oblivious son. It will cut me up later that he can't see me and that he'll never know me. But right now I'm still heady with happiness, overjoyed just to share his air.

"Sam," I say.

I'm happy to let my hand hover above the black down on his head. He stills.

"Sam," I say again, and it's so much like he can hear me I can barely bring myself to remember that he can't.

He's gazing into the trees. It's strange because this is a little kid's face, but the eyes set in it belong to an old man. My son looks like he's thinking over something mightily important. Sure, he's probably just hoping he'll get chicken nuggets for lunch; but with those eyes, I'm sure he'll be on the tribal council one day. He'd be the elder everyone rushes to for advice. His words would be cool pebbles, just like Harry's.

But I hope with all my heart that won't be the case. I hope Sam makes it off the rez.

Man, how could someone so _good_ have come from me?

"Sam!" Emily calls.

We both turn.

"Come on," she says. "Lunch is ready, baby."

She seems like an older woman. I don't know what it is. Her movements are those of experience, of motherhood. Her voice is deeper and smoother and slower.

Sam scrambles to his feet and rushes inside; whirling little feet and soft scrunched up hands and tufts of black hair. I gaze after him and his tiny body, wrapped in a pale blue hoody and crazy small jeans and little brown plimsolls. When will I see him again?

Emily sits on the steps into the garden. She's warming her hands on a large cup of tea, and taking long sips and staring off into the trees like her eyes are too tired to move that much.

She must be exhausted, looking after a kid all on her own.

I feel like it's time to go, but something is keeping me behind: something… unanswered. I gaze and gaze at Emily.

I don't know how to explain this. It's like, something _isn't_ happening.

And then from nowhere, that feeling of lightness surges up again.

And I realise.

My imprint is gone.

Emily hauls herself off the steps and turns to return inside just as I stand and stagger backwards.

I keep staggering, staggering and lurching. I manage to turn around at one point, and I'm finally running in the same direction my body is facing. I keep glancing over my shoulder at the red house. How does it manage to loom like that when it's so little?

The lightness floods through me and weakens me so I can barely feel myself breathe and my bones are fading away.

I know I'm panicking. My eyes are wide and I'm jumping about. I jump out of my skin when Leah comes at me from the shadows of the tree line, even though part of the reason I'm panicking is because I can't find her.

Her brow furrows as I pant and pant. She reaches up to rest her hands on my chest and then halfway there remembers and lets them fall.

"Okay, Sam. It's okay," she says.

In my mind my son is running. He's running and running, branches tugging at his tiny blue hood, and I realise he's running away from me.

Leah's telling me to breathe deeply. She keeps telling me it's okay, but it's not. How can it be? She starts walking, and I follow her into the forest. We sit side by side on a large mossy rock.

She lets me get my breathing right.

I feel like I'm sucking air through a straw, and the air is hot, like I'm sitting in a stuffy sweaty greenhouse, butterflies flitting around my head and flicking me in the eyes.

Why do I need to breathe so badly? For Christ's sake – I'm dead, aren't I?

And then suddenly it's gone. The stagnant, hot air is swept away and everything is fresh and clean again. And I don't need to breathe. I don't.

But I breathe anyway. The air is sweet and cool, and it's a part of me, and as it circles through me I feel I'm being cleaned and refreshed and renewed.

I swear I won't stop breathing until I'm really gone.

"Is she managing okay? Emily?" I ask.

"Yes," says Leah.

My head has ended up in my hands. I plead with her to be honest. She sighs.

"Listen," I hear her voice. "As far as I can see, she's happy, and she's doing well. And that's what's important. Of course money is tight, but we're a family here, and we help each other out."

God, she sounds like Old Quil.

"I couldn't help her out with any of the money stuff. I left her with _nothing._ "

Leah snorts. "We're all broke here, Sam."

This feels familiar.

We've done this before.

Me: trying my best to be inconsolable; Leah: consoling me anyway. Normally, I would feel her hand lift up about now to rub smooth circles between my shoulder blades. She used to turn my back into one of those lakes made beautiful by a casually slung stone, rings of water radiating from its centre.

"She's happy, Sam. Trust me."

I shake my head into its finger-palm cup.

"I feel I owe her some sort of explanation. I disappeared without even telling her I loved her."

Leah scoffs.

"Jesus. You saved her from a burning building. I think she knows you loved her."

We both know there's more to it than that. It was a dumb, facetious thing of me to say. How could Emily not have known? I told her "I love you" about a million times a day, through the chains that held us together.

"Okay, good," I say. "I want her to know that. Even if, maybe, none of it was real."

I feel Leah's breath hitch beside me.

Hesitantly, she speaks. "You mean... Because it was an imprint?"

I'm not hesitant. I shoot back immediately: "Yes."

"And it's gone," I bleat. "The imprint, I mean. I realised just then when I saw her. I guess death breaks the bond. And none of it was real. None of it. All of that love, it wasn't really me. A whole chunk of my life wasn't really me. It belonged to some love-struck zombie."

"Don't say that," said Leah. She sounds angry.

Why would she be angry?

"Just because it was an imprint, doesn't mean it wasn't real," she says. "Those feelings existed, didn't they? You felt them. We all felt them."

She doesn't get it: I don't _care._ I straighten, and look Leah dead in the eyes.

"The point is, it's gone," I state. "The imprint's gone, and everything it fogged out has come back. My vision is ten times clearer."

I pause.

"I see _you_ , Leah," I almost whisper. "And all my feelings for you – it's like they never left."

It's safe to say her reaction is not what I would have hoped for.

For a moment, her face is blank. And then someone places a mask of horror on top of it. She looks at me as if for the first time, and leaps back off the rock like it's falling into a pit of lava.

There she is, now, in the branches of a tree, and I'm poised to follow her, poised on the edge of the rock, frozen, thinking why why why what what what…

She's breathing heavily. She's blinking again. And she's shaking her head.

Oh, no, she's shaking her head.

"I'm going," she manages. "Can't do this. To myself. Bad."

"Leah," I plead.

She shakes her head and closes her eyes, like she's trying to shake me out of her mind, but I'm right here I'm right here I'm real, Leah.

"Don't follow me," she says.

And then she's gone.

* * *

 _A/N: Late night update; apologies for typos._


	8. Chapter 8 - Paths

_Their upward path_

 _was dark and steep; the mists they met were thick;_

 _the silences, unbroken. But at last,_

 _they'd almost reached the upper world, when he,_

 _afraid that she might disappear again_

 _and longing so to see her, turned to gaze_

 _back at his wife. At once she slipped away –_

 _and down. His arms stretched out convulsively_

 _to clasp and to be clasped in turn, but there_

 _was nothing but the unresisting air._

 _\- 'The Metamorphoses; Book 10,' Ovid_

Sue had said to make sure you knew I was a lost cause; but I revelled in the feeling that you still had faith in me.

When we had been walking, I heard your footsteps falling behind mine, and I imagined the trails we marked running alongside one another like two rivers, weaving in and out, threading together and coming apart.

I pushed vines and branches out of our way, and I felt your steady gaze between my shoulder blades, but I didn't turn once to look at you. I was just a back, and to me you were nothing but heavy breaths and footfalls.

I'd heard a lot about paths recently. It was the collective favourite word of the tribal council. They were always throwing it around, like, "Sam, this is the path your spirit has chosen; Sam, you must follow in the path of your ancestors," and so on. One time, Billy asked me if I had seen the path my wolf-brother was treading beside me, and I told him, "Yeah, the paw-prints are super cute." He ran his chair over my foot, but honestly, what did he want me to say?

Stupid paths.

For all the council's talk, I knew the only path I was walking one of serious damage and destruction. My life felt like that drunken stumble home at 2 in the morning. You know what I mean: when you drop your shit all down the road and knock over someone's pot plant and leave your front door wide open before passing out on your sofa, and then you wake up the next morning, surrounded by debris, and you peer around you, and you're like… shit.

But walking with you in the forest felt so good, because for once my path was guiding someone rather than cutting through them. It felt so good I didn't want to stop, even though my imprint ached as I moved away from Emily. To tell you the truth, Leah, if I'd had my way you would still be following me through the forest. We would amble forever in peace, ducking under mossy vines and branches, stepping gingerly over velvet logs.

But of course I stopped. I found a clearing. And I turned around and became once again a face and eyes and a waggling tongue. And I saw you.

You looked the same. I don't know what I'd expected. I was pretty arrogant, so I'd probably half been hoping to see you pooled on the floor, all shrunken and shrivelled, stretching out to me with shaking hands saying, "Sam… please… take me back… I need you…"

The only thing I noticed was scratch marks on your arms. You caught me looking and tugged the sleeves of your hoody down.

I guess that was another thing that was different: I'd never seen you wear a hoody before.

Weakly, I said, "Go to college."

You shook your head firmly. "I'll go when you go."

We searched each other's faces.

You must have phoned me a million times. Emily had pestered and pestered me to call you back. When I finally did, I hadn't got past hello before you demanded an explanation. I asked to talk to you here in the forest because I'm selfish and it was where I'd come to feel most comfortable.

"No, Leah," I said. "I'm not going anymore."

"Why not?"

"I just can't, Leah."

"Just tell me why, Sam."

"Because I have… commitments."

Your eyebrows raised.

"Emily?" you asked. "She doesn't want you to go to college? Jheez, Sam, what kind of a girlfriend…"

I shook my head. "It's not that."

You folded your arms and let your eyes run all over me. "No," you said. "I didn't think so."

I appeared to have lost my voice, and stared at the ground gloomily.

Then, "Listen, Sam. If you can just tell me what this is about, I can help you get out of it."

I found my voice. "I don't need your help!" I shot.

Through the tense air, we began to search each other again; just a pair of detectives, looking for clues.

You murmured, "Whatever's going on, I cannot grasp how it could be more important than everything w– , that you planned." You shook your head, smiling. "You had so many plans, Sam. Does not even one of them fit into this elaborate network of _commitments_ you've got yourself tangled up in?"

You weren't going to back down. I could see us going round in circles for hours.

The first time I phased, I ran for miles, all the way to Canada. It took me weeks to figure out how to stop, let alone how to phase back. When I finally managed to haul myself home to La Push, Billy had been waiting for me on First Beach. Behind his chair swept a carpet of blue and white pebbles and his eyes were two wet black stones. It didn't surprise me in the slightest that Billy was in on the whole, "Guess what? You're stuck with a smelly, oversized mutt for the rest of your short life, get used to it!" joke.

"You're a protector now, Sam," he smiled. With the same smile he told me I had a grave responsibility to keep this all a secret. My sole confidants were to be a bunch of mad old men. "Nothing comes above the secret, Sam. No matter how important it seems. Protectors make sacrifices for the good of their tribe." I wanted to smack that stupid smile off his sad old face. I wanted to shout, "This isn't good news!"

In the clearing, Billy was between us, repeating himself. "Keep the secret." I could almost see the outline of his chair, like he'd parked it by the trees; the shadow of his proud torso and wasted legs; his cold eyes boring into me, daring me to betray the council.

My options were pretty limited. As much as I stretched, I couldn't see one possible outcome to this situation which involved me telling you the truth. So Sue was right: somehow, I had to assure you of the fact I wasn't worth your time – which meant there was also no possible outcome to this situation which involved you not coming to see me as a complete asshole.

"Jesus Christ. Okay, Leah. Look." I shook my head, feigning exasperation. It appeared 'complete asshole' was a role that came naturally to me.

"There's nothing bigger going on," I said. "The truth is people change. You just have to learn to deal with it and move on! I don't want to go to college anymore. It's as simple as that. And I don't want you anymore."

At the time, I missed the next few seconds. But watching it over, I see you step back like I pushed you, and I see stunned hurt write itself all over your face. At the time I wasn't paying attention. Now I want to rush forwards and wrap you in my arms and dab small plasters over all your cuts and bruises, and your scratches. But I'm just a helpless bystander and the scene plays on. I have to watch myself miss those seconds, and only catch the next, when you shout, "You arrogant shit!" and launch yourself across the clearing towards me. My slip of fire: burning up the space between us; and burning me like I was just a candlewick.

I'm holding my arms over my head, cowering, even though the storm of punches you were throwing down felt like nothing more than rain-patter. I think I was scared of what I might see if I met your eyes. I didn't know what would be worse, anger or pain.

You see, I might have been a monstrous werewolf, but all that doggy badness did not change one thing about the fact Sam Uley was – is – nothing but a big old scaredy-cat.

I didn't need to be scared: it turns out all I was hiding from was a whole load of bitterness.

You stepped back, panting. There were still flames everywhere – in the air; under your skin, wiggling through in beads of sweat; on your tongue, threatening to push their way out of your mouth.

"You think I'm hung up on you," you stated.

I waited. I was half-relieved and half-humiliated that you'd drawn this conclusion.

"Man," you said. "If you thought you were the only one begging to clamber into my bed every night, you're dumber than I realised, Sam Uley."

I looked away and grimaced like my grandmother had just told a dirty joke.

"If I'm hung up on anything, I'm hung up on your future." You squeezed your eyes shut in frustration. "I cannot just let you throw it away. I cannot just turn a blind eye and let that happen – as much as I'd like to!"

As yours had gained in strength, my voice had gone all weak and pleading. "What can I do to make you just stay out of it?" I begged.

And there it was: we'd fallen back into our old pattern. As always, I was asking you for advice. But you didn't give any this time. You just laughed. It was short and humourless. And you said, "Nothing I can think of."

I looked at you helplessly. You held up your arms and shrugged like you had nothing for me.

"I'm not just going to give up on you."

Your arms fell to your sides. I watched your hands flop a little limply on your thighs, like salmon not strong enough to make it upriver.

"If I give up on you, I give up on everything."

In a moment of clarity, I understood. (I think).

You saw it like this: if I forewent college, it would mean the rez really was a trap. You wouldn't be able to fulfil all your hopes and aspirations in the happy knowledge that escape was possible for anyone who wanted it, because I would be left behind.

The next day, I found a neat pile of notes and books on Emily's porch. I plucked a crumpled sheet of paper from the top, recognising the handwriting. Then I recognised it was mine.

These were my notes and books: an accumulation of innumerable afternoons spent studying at your house. The pile had been held down by a paperweight, which was now held in my hand. I gazed at it, struck by familiarity. Briefly, I searched for the teenage-love-song-elation I knew I'd felt once upon a time, with stolen kisses in your bedroom while your parents cooked dinner downstairs; scribbling my pointless thoughts over reams and reams of notebook, waiting for the moment you would set your homework down and crawl over to me to take off my reading glasses.

I stared at the paper in my hand.

 _...There is a futility in hoping these desires will be realised, which exacerbates the protagonists' self-revulsion. Once a "faunlet," Annabel's "equal," Humbert is now a "law-abiding poltroon," meaning age forever bars him from his "enchanted island." Andrea's symbol of lifeless, soulless beauty, the mountain, stretches through the sky yet never touches heaven, much like he watches artists whose "works drop groundward" nevertheless "reach many a time a heaven that's shut to [him]." Both men appear to feel earth-bound, the realm of nymphets as unreachable as the realm of angels. Humbert in particular emphasises this through language of unattainability. He once bids some nymphets "play around me forever" – "around," but not "with." He also finds himself "lumbering," a verb with the connotation of struggle, behind Monique, but never falling into step..._

Who wrote that?

I scrutinised my handwriting, curving and swooping freely over the page.

Now, I'm looking at you. You're tugging your sleeves down over your arms. I've made you conscious of the scratch marks still there. I'm sorry.

You seem upset.

Why…

Why are you looking at me like that?

"Why?" you grind out through gritted teeth. "You're asking me why?"

The words shake and rattle, and it sounds so wrong. I don't know if I'll ever get used to this – you, being a person who cries.

"I have a few 'why's for you, Sam Uley!" you spit.

"Why are you plaguing me with all this? Why are you forcing me think about stuff I haven't thought about in years? Why can't you leave me alone?"

"Leah," I plead. "Just let me talk to you. I think you're the only person who can help me!"

You claw at your hair, and throw anguished looks in my direction. Your eyes are wide and almost rolling.

"I'm not crazy!" you shriek. "Get out of my head! Get out! Get out!"

* * *

 _A/N: Thanks so much to brankel1 for your ongoing encouragement, it means lots and lots; and thank you to others who are taking the time to review. xxx_

 _Sam's essay includes quotes from 'Lolita' (Vladimir Nabokov), and 'Andrea del Sarto' (Robert Browning)._


	9. Chapter 9 - This old track

_I thought I heard her behind my back,_

 _Yea, her I long had learned to lack,_

 _And I said: "I am sure you are standing behind me,_

 _Though how do you get into this old track?"_

 _And there was no sound but the fall of a leaf_

 _As a sad response; and to keep down grief_

 _I would not turn my head to discover_

 _That there was nothing in my belief._

 _\- 'The Shadow on the Stone,' Thomas Hardy_

Every morning, Sam waits for me.

First time, I nearly jumped out of my skin.

I had just finished giving Seth breakfast. Had kissed his crispy cheek goodbye and told him to come join us on patrol if he felt like it. Received a little grunt in response. Telling the truth, that is a better response than I have come to expect. So go Seth.

Walked out the front door. Was met by the inquisitive stare of a pair of brown shoulders.

Bastard had sat himself down on my front step!

Sam stood and turned to me. Caught sight of my arms windmilling while I tried to stay upright. Tried not to fall away in fright. (Did not do a great job).

By the time he took a step towards me I was steady. When I was steady I started walking. Walked right past him without sparing him a glance. And he tailed me.

Every morning since he has been waiting.

And that is how it goes. That is our routine.

Should say _my_ routine. Because this Sam is me. Just me. Just a part of my mind that has somehow separated from the rest of my mind. Drifted out of my safe sheltered skull into the world.

Sometimes he speaks.

Usually goes a bit like this.

Sam: Leah! I'm going to be stuck here for all eternity! You're the only one who can help me leave! Leah, if you ignore me I'll disappear again! I don't want to be trapped here. You have to help me get out!

Me: –

Oh. I'm over there. See? Just ran into the trees.

Me (in my head): Not real not real not real

But mostly he stays silent.

So now, I do not only have to put up with the unspeaking stares in my house – kitchen cabinets, bathroom mirror, teal wall, dead-eyed brother – but also outside in the forest and road. Sam's eyes follow me everywhere.

Have started scratching again. Paul noticed before I did. Saw red welts on that soft part inside my arm.

Sam's eyes

Sam's eyes follow me everywhere.

 _Not real not real not real_

Miss my pack.

I know I have a pack. But

But it does not feel like it.

You see there is no together. We are all apart. Seven wolves stumbling through the same forest but too lost in our own heads to see each other. Or even feel each other. Jared. Uninterested. Embry. Unrecognisable. Wes and Henry always giving me trouble. Over Seth.

And Seth.

Will not phase. Will not stop sneaking off. Returning after a few days looking like a wilted flower.

Winter leaf. Crunches underfoot. Crumbles at the slightest brush of your finger and flies away in the wind. Seth.

My yellow skin child.

Unreachable child.

Well. Without Paul my whole pack is unreachable. But most of all my little brother.

Will not listen to me. Would listen to Jacob but Jacob is unreachable too. Man. How do I know Jacob is not the one giving Seth drugs in the first place?

So you see there is an explanation for all this. Of that I am pretty much certain. I am very stressed. Not certain of much but certain I am stressed. It makes sense after all.

Makes sense things are coming apart a little up top. Makes sense the stress will fall away when I work to sort the pack out. Makes sense the staring figure in the corner of my eye will fall away too.

Do not want this second shadow anymore. One who moves of his own accord.

Stress will fall away like tumbling pine cones that leave behind a fresh pine tree.

Thing is. I cannot lose my mind. Simply cannot afford it. Tell me what would happen to Seth if I lost my mind. Tell me what Paul would do if I lost my mind.

So I will not lose my mind.

Tumbling pine cones, Leah.

 _Not real not real not real_

How long will it take for me to believe it?

No.

Fresh pine leaves. Green. Glassy.

I believe it.

I will not lose my mind.

* * *

 _A/N: A little short and filler-like I know. Next chapter will hopefully be more in-depth. My new favourite thing is receiving an email saying I have a new review; it's the loveliest feeling in the world._


	10. Chapter 10 - Pigeon feathers

_A/N: It has been soooo long since I updated. Largely because this is simply a behemothic chapter - by my standards, anyhow. It's a nice long chapter in Leah voice like the second one in the story. I love writing Leah. Thanks for all the reviews so far and I hope you drop a few more by!_

* * *

 _On his eyes will I gaze, and there delight me;_

 _While I conceal my love no frown can fright me._

 _To be more happy I dare not aspire,_

 _Nor can I fall more low, mounting no higher._

' _Hidden Flame,' John Dryden_

Forest feels heavy today.

Like the trees are all breathing really

Heavily.

Everywhere I smell wet ferns. It is a cloying smell.

And the breath of the trees lands on my back and grows drops of water there. So my fur is wet too.

Wet and sticking to me.

See the green.

Think about the green.

It is everywhere.

Occasionally broken by a cedar baring its skin.

Rare occasion.

Looks like blood has spurted from a wound and sprayed over the uniform trunks.

And the moss and lichen and weeds and damp and leaves hurry to make the tree decent again.

Fractured light filters through the canopy. Comes through in beams. Reveals the motes of lichen. Swarming the air like flies.

Seth used to say the light looked like strands of hair.

Someone had crowed, _Whose? An angel's?_

Probably Embry.

Others laughed. But my little brother did not reply. And I knew he was thinking

To himself

 _Maybe_.

Because he was and is a stupid kid.

Ferns rustle and break my thoughts.

My deep deep insightful contemplation on the State of Seth.

Thicket is moving. Knocking around like something is passing through it.

Tiny feet patter through my mind and I think no.

Do not want this to be happening.

Thought it had gone away. Thought this had stopped.

Sure. Sam has plagued me for nearly a month now. But have not heard the pattering feet in as much time.

Well.

Brace myself.

Perhaps now I will see it. Whatever it is.

Tiny thing that has been running circles around me and always keeping out of sight.

Yeah. That.

Man. Going crazy.

Hear feet approaching. But funny because they do not sound tiny. Sound heavy and large. Enough to thud. No pattering.

Thicket jerks one last time and then spits out a pale ball of fur.

Lands at my feet and scrambles back in surprise to see my hackles raised.

Henry.

Rearrange myself.

And my relief permeates the background.

Not going crazy. Doing okay, Leah.

Hiss, _What do you think you are playing at?_

 _Nothing bad!_ He claims. All indignant at this charge on his innocence. _Hunting!_

That is when I notice the rabbit hanging from his jaws. Limp. Soft ears coated in slobber.

Gives a feeble jerk as Henry nods smugly.

 _Dinner,_ he announces. _That's me sorted for tonight. Can you say the same for yourself, boss?_

Bad thing about being a wolf is your face just cannot express the right intensity of disgust.

Stalk past him.

 _So,_ I say. A _lready preparing for your future career as a tramp, Henry. Very good._

Scoops up the rabbit and hurries to catch up with me.

Laughs. _Lighten up, grandma!_

Shake my head.

Exasperated.

Not about how light or not I am. Man.

 _If you are running around killing innocent animals you are not exactly focussed on your patrol. Are you?_

 _Yes boss, sorry boss!_ Henry intones immediately. _On the lookout for approaching vampires, pronto!_

Runs ahead.

Realise that a few weeks ago I would be lecturing him by now. Saying things like, you do not know what it was like when the leeches were on our doorstep. Friends of the Cullens passed through these lands constantly.

Now. Just do not feel the urge.

Am I tired?

Am I even older?

Maybe I am better.

Henry has paused.

 _Hey, there's one hiding in the trees here! Don't worry, I've got him!_

Dives into the heart of a branching maple. Emerges a moment later coughing up cobwebs. Out loud he splutters. In my mind he wails.

 _Urgh! Do not go in there. Seriously!_

 _Yeah,_ I reply. _Was not planning on it._

Caught up with him by now. And carry on walking past him.

Again he runs to catch up. Runs ahead. Runs up one of the slopes on either side of us.

Moment later jumps out at me. Down from a low branch. Tree holds him up like a kindly father. And like a petulant kid he does not even stop to thank it.

Shouts _Boo!_ at me.

Maybe not petulant. Maybe just over-excited.

Nod at him like he said good morning and keep walking. Piercing whine jangles in my skull.

 _Aw, boss. You're no fun!_

 _So I have been told._

Henry snorts.

Bounds ahead. Right up there by a cluster of cottonwoods.

And I could swear –

Yep.

Imbecile kid is wiggling his furry butt at me.

Now I know why he went so far ahead. Out of reach.

But I do not care.

In fact.

Truth be told.

Cannot help laughing.

And then I cannot stop.

Guess some of my ha's worm into the kid's head because his wolf turns and grins at me.

Eyes shining.

Triumphant.

Trots back to my side.

 _I knew I would break you,_ he says.

Attempts some kind of Russian accent. Overall effect is pretty alarming.

 _Yeah, yeah, Ivan,_ I say.

Grins again. Rabbit flops limply.

And then.

Faintly.

Twig snaps.

Quiet sound. Very qiuet.

Was a small twig. Broken by something small.

Begins then. Steps butterflying over the earth. Shuffling through the wet leaves.

Feet. Tiny feet.

Tiny foot that took a deliberate step to scare me.

No. Leah.

You are not going crazy. You are not.

There are no small feet. There is nothing there.

But I can hear it. Can hear that tiny thing bustling about.

Swear I even heard it puff in frustration.

 _Everything okay, boss?_

Henry considering me warily.

Another twig snaps. Low plants dancing as something moves through them.

Desperately: _Henry, can you hear that?_

Slowly: Hear what, boss?

 _No,_ I say. _Knew you couldn't._

But I can.

In fact.

Can hear it getting louder.

Closer.

So. Was right earlier. I will see it.

Any moment now.

Brace myself yet again. Forget about Henry yet again.

Right by the brush line now.

And then it is out.

But I see nothing.

Hear those tiny feet patter past us. Watch its invisible path. See the ferns on the other side make way for it. And hear it patter away.

But see nothing.

Stare after.

Until pale fur invades my sight. Explosion.

Leap back.

 _Jeez, Henry, get away from me!_

 _Oh, well excuse me!_ he cries. _Just wanted to check everything was still functioning up there! You kind of didn't move for like five whole minutes!_

 _It was not five minutes,_ I grumble. And move past him.

Begin to stride. Want to cover as much ground as possible in as little time as possible.

Do not know why.

Maybe it will make things feel better.

Maybe had enough of this

Cub scurries to keep up.

 _What happened just then? You were totally out of it. Did you say you could hear something? Because I was straining my wolfy senses and all that and I could not hear a thing, I swear. Are we in danger? Is it vampires? Is it? Is it actually vampires?_

 _No,_ I say.

 _Then what is it? What was that?_

 _Focus on your patrol,_ I instruct him.

Henry stops. Incredulous.

 _So that's it?_

He vaults forward again and I feel his breath in my ear. But keep my eyes trained straight ahead. Feet pacing.

Even. In time.

One

Two

One two

 _I don't even get an explanation? I can't believe this._

 _I don't owe you an explanation, for Christ's sake! I'm your Alpha! Does that not mean anything to you? I've told you you're not in danger. Now can you just let it drop?_

Feel his irritable sigh next to me.

 _Fine,_ he says.

 _Thank-you._

Lasts about a minute.

 _Leah, can I just ask – how have you been sleeping recently?_

 _Henry! Shut up! Do your patrol!_

 _Fine!_ he retorts sharply. Repeating himself.

Everything is okay.

We are walking. I am not thinking about the pattering thing.

And then Henry starts doing something weird with his head.

Swings it back and forth like a pendulum. Side to side.

Close my eyes and breathe out slowly.

Will I get no peace?

 _Hey. Grandfather clock._

 _Are you talking to me, Grandma?_

 _Yeah. Quit doing that with your head._

Incensed now. _Doing what?_ he cries.

 _Swinging it like that._

 _Oh my god, Leah. I'm focussing on my patrol. I can't do anything right, can I? You know, for the Alpha of a top-secret wolf-pack, you are_ seriously _demanding._

Made me laugh for the second time today.

Strange.

But considering what is normal for me these days. Stranger the better.

Nudge him.

 _Keep moving, pup,_ I say.

 _Yes boss,_ he replies.

Know what he is going to ask.

 _Really, though, Leah. Are you sure you're alright?_

But my reply was kind of unexpected.

 _No,_ I say solemnly. Henry looks expectant. _I am half left._

Takes a moment. But then Henry roars with laughter.

Cannot remember the last time I made someone laugh.

In a good way I mean. Not a bitter resentful way. Or a scornful way.

 _Leah._ Hear Henry's unbroken voice. _I didn't know you could tell such a mean Dad joke!_

 _I was a pro at Dad jokes in my time,_ I say.

True though. Kind of was.

 _There's a lot of things I don't know about you, Queen Alpha Lady._

 _Well. There are a lot of things you don't know about everything, puny subject._

 _That's fair,_ Henry concedes.

 _I am fine,_ I tell him. _Really. Do not worry about me._

I am fine I am fine I am fine.

Up ahead. See silver pooling underneath a moss coated maple. Mirror left on its back in the leaves.

Opalescent mass rises as we near it.

Stretches its legs. Yawns and shows its teeth. Blinks and shows it eyes.

Butter.

Amber.

Paul.

Old wolf plods towards us. And some kind of happy relief spreads through me.

 _I am fine,_ I tell Henry again. And now I believe it.

Strange how calm Paul is now.

Eyes feel like a warm hug as they hold mine.

Remember the kind of heat used to fill his eyes. Was not so friendly. Used to burn. Now they only melt a little.

He nods. Wants to know if we had a good patrol.

 _Uh, what do you think?_ Henry says. Like it is blindingly obvious.

Proves his point by shaking the dead rabbit in his elder's face. Paul grumbles irritably. Swots the limp thing away.

 _I forget how annoying you are,_ he says.

 _Thanks!_ Henry replies and gallops ahead.

Rabbit cartwheeling round his face. Kind of like propellers. So Henry is a little furry helicopter.

Paul and set off at the same moment. We amble together through the forest.

Would have been very peaceful if that ball of pale fur had not been cannoning around us. Darting and bouncing and pointing stuff out all excited.

Henry shouts boo at Paul from behind a tree. Clearly this trick never gets old for him.

Latter grunts mildly. Then asks, _How do you have so much energy?_

 _Dunno. Youth, I guess,_ Henry quips.

Throws Paul for a second. Then his brows lower over his eyes and he seethes.

By then Henry has already moved on.

 _What are you doing here anyway, Uncle?_

Paul is off-balance. Adjusts to the new subject.

 _I, er, came to meet Leah. After her patrol._

 _Ah,_ replies Henry. _I'm sure you meant to say Leah and Henry, after their patrol?_

 _No, I really didn't,_ Paul returns.

 _Oh, right!_ Henry says brightly. _Must have been a pleasant surprise for you, then._

 _Yeah, about as pleasant as the time my parents walked in on me halfway through a ferocious wank._

Groan.

 _Please, Paul,_ I say. _You will put Henry off his dinner._

Indicate the rabbit. Seems to have gathered a lot of dirt since Henry first caught it.

Young wolf guffaws.

 _I love walking with you two,_ he says. _Will you walk me the whole way home?_

Tickle of laughter on my ribs.

Paul sighs deeply. Does not get it.

Never used to be slow on the uptake.

Swear it was Paul that kept all the running gags going in the pack. Was always the first to retaliate with a sharp joke.

Things change I guess.

I guess?

I know.

Henry barrels playfully into Paul's old ribs.

 _Don't worry, you smooth bastard. I'll let you two have your alone time!_

Cackles madly. Then catches himself.

 _That is – if that's okay, Leah?_

 _Yeah, more than okay._

 _Alright, alright!_ he says. _Jeez, I can tell when I'm not wanted._

 _Wow, Henry,_ I reply. _You are so observant._

 _I know,_ he says.

Bolts off. Find myself wondering if that poor rabbit will make it to his home in one piece.

Now we are alone together.

And Paul grumbles.

 _I thought he'd never leave._

This is all normal. Paul muttering scathingly about Wes or Henry. Silence that nestles between us as we drop new paw-prints over our well-trodden earth.

What is not normal is that Paul seems

Kind of.

Embarrassed?

Yes.

And something else.

Think he is searching for something to say.

Not like us at all.

 _How is Seth doing?_ Paul speaks finally.

And I am about to answer. Honestly.

But.

Feel someone fall into step beside us.

Shadow spreads from the corner of my left eye to its centre. Stretching fingers of black mist.

Dare myself to look. And of course I see Sam.

See his wolf padding peacefully through the solid tree trunks. See him keeping time with us. Like how he used to do patrols.

Military.

Marching like we were soldiers.

Feel sad all of a sudden.

Three of us have never walked together before.

 _Leah?_ Paul probes. Yanks me back. Back to the question at hand.

Question at hand.

Seth.

Move real quick. Quick enough to stifle the images of Seth threatening to bubble up and overflow. Seth lost. Seth crying. Seth with needle marks in his arms and legs. Throw myself over him. Pin him down before he can escape.

 _Seth? He's not doing so bad._

Truth is. Have not seen him in two days.

He will come back though. Always does. Just do not know when.

And that…

Never mind.

(That is what kills me).

 _Right,_ Paul says.

Can tell he does not believe a word I say. But he does not push the matter.

Guess he wants to wait for me to feel ready to open up.

Silly wolf going to be waiting a long time.

Starts searching for a new subject. Pretty determined on conversation today that is for sure. It is different.

Strange.

 _Remember that time…_ Paul begins. And I think.

Great.

Paul is going on one of his reminiscing binges.

Man. Do I love these.

No.

Hate them.

 _Remember that time Seth stole one of Jacob's bikes? And he said he was going to start up a pizza delivery business? But he hadn't found anyone to make the pizza, or anyone to buy the pizza, and so he just drove round on Jacob's bike up near the Makah rez? And then Jacob caught him and he got so mad… But you managed to convince him to let Seth off the hook. What did you say? The kid has "entrepreneurial vision," or something –_

Interrupt him.

 _Paul._

What? Enough is enough.

 _Yeah?_ he asks. Tone kind of sullen.

To my left black ears droop. Black head lowers moodily to the ground.

Shift my body.

Know it is stupid. But I want to block Paul's view of Sam. As if he is some kind of bad influence. Even though all Paul sees is endless green of moss and vines and leaves. No black wolf cutting into it.

Man. Am I jealous.

 _Can we just –_

Trying.

 _Can we just not talk about this? No point dwelling on the past, you know, when there is stuff we need to deal with happening right now._

Paul throws his amber eyes onto the deep emerald everywhere around. To my left brown eyes roll too.

Infuriation prickles.

Ignore him.

Sam.

Pretty hard when he is stumbling about like that.

See. Paul scuffed a log with his paw and Sam tried to copy him. But of course the tree he swiped at never felt him. Guess he was thrown. Now he is stumbling.

Kind of funny I suppose.

Looks like I'm flanked by a pair of stroppy teenagers.

 _You're right,_ Paul allows.

Realise we have stopped. I start moving again. Immediately followed on both sides.

From my right I hear,

 _What do you want to talk about?_

Reply, _Dunno._

And I bound ahead. Root tries to trip me up and I leap over it. Dodge out the way of a log fallen in my path. Play with the forest.

 _Wait!_ Paul cries. _Give me a minute, Jesus._

 _That is right. I am your Lord and Saviour. Bow down before me._

Say this from the crest of a valley. Looking down at him.

Paul huffsa laugh.

Scrambles up the steep incline and shoves into me.

 _Hey!_ I shout. Shove back into him.

And my laughs shove into his laughs. I follow him through the forest. White legs kicking and spurting.

Black legs following behind. Little slower.

Teeth on the scruff of his neck. Claws running through fur. We roll over one another. Once.

Paul gets up. Trots forward. I stay on the forest floor.

Looks over his shoulder after a moment.

See his eyes.

Never seen them like that before.

Mischievous. Inviting. Playful.

Amber melted to butter.

Part of me wants to follow him further into the forest. Gambol like Henry. Pale wolf who seems not to have a worry in the world.

Most of me is too tired.

My back prickles. Behind me Sam steps through the trees.

Mass of black shadow. Still and silent. Feel him willing me to join him.

Lithe white wolf urging me to come forward.

Do not want to move at all.

Eventually Paul lopes back.

No. Not trotting anymore.

Lowers himself to the ground in front of me.

There is a wet maple leaf on his head. Plastered between his ears like a little hat.

Paul. Moment ago his eyes were deep pools. Open. Now I see two doors close over the wells.

He is himself again.

Old wolf. Tired man.

 _Come on,_ I say. And haul myself to my feet.

 _Okay,_ Paul replies.

Traipsing side by side. Tell him he has a leaf on his head.

He says, _Do I?_

Say, _You look like Robin Hood._

Paul chuckles. White whiskers framing his lips flutter. Touched by his breath.

Makes me think of sea-wind blowing a ship's sails.

 _How have your patrols been going?_ I ask him. _Embry? How is he?_

 _Fine,_ Paul assures me. _Well, you know. It's weird. He doesn't speak._

Strange noise comes from the black wolf beside me. From his throat. Little whine.

When Sam was alive all Embry did was talk.

 _Yeah,_ I say.

Eloquent as ever.

 _At least I'm not with Wes,_ Paul says bitterly. _I hate that kid._

Hate suddenly sounds like a strong word to me.

 _We never gave Sam anything like that kind of cheek._

 _Guess I just lack his authority._

Trying to ignore those black ears. Pricked at the sound of his name.

Paul sighs. _Not what I meant._

 _I know._

Brief silence comes and goes. Paul is the one to break it. Asks about Henry. Asks if I am making any progress.

 _Is he still an annoying little shit, you mean?_ I reply. _Yeah, he is. You got a brief taster back then. I had that this whole morning._

Paul chuckles again.

 _Well, I'm glad some things don't change,_ he says. Hear the smile in his voice.

 _You know,_ he goes on. _I was thinking, actually. About how to help Embry._

 _Oh yeah?_ I enquire. And I see Sam's head bobbing in the corner of my eye.

Nodding. Encouraging Paul to go on.

Pointlessly block him again.

Just annoys me.

I am his Alpha. Take your heavy knowing blinks and your "talk to me Paul" eyes elsewhere.

 _I thought,_ Paul begins. _I thought it might be good to try to kind of, um, get Embry and Jacob back together, again. I mean sure they both lost Quil; but why do they have to lose their other best friend as well? If they weren't so alone they would both get better. Heal. I'm sure of it._

Cut in.

 _Have you seen Jake recently?_

Might be doing Paul an injustice. But kind of think I know what this is really about.

Old times.

Jacob and Quil and Embry were inseparable back then.

Paul and his stupid Old Times.

Back when the old times were actually taking place Paul was the last person any of us would have expected to become a nostalgic old git. Least of all himself.

 _No,_ he admits. _Which is why I wanted to go and see him after this. And I was hoping that –_

 _Nope,_ I say. Before he can get any further.

 _Come on, Leah,_ Paul whines. _I really think you should come._

 _Really think I should not,_ I reply.

 _Why?_ he asks.

Stops and faces me.

Resign. Face him too.

Paul was not there the last time I went to see Jacob. Did not see the word coward push itself out of my mouth. Did not hear Jacob telling me never to come near him again.

 _Just get this vague feeling he would not want me there,_ I say. _But go on, have a bro-to-bro. Will be interesting to hear what he says about me behind my back at least._

 _Don't talk like that!_ Paul snaps. _The two of you had such a good bond. If it wasn't for you, the pack would have been wiped out in that stupid battle. I'm sure that –_

 _Dwelling,_ I say.

Paul wavers.

 _I… What?_

 _Dwelling,_ I repeat. _What have I told you about dwelling?_

Conversation pauses.

Paul softens.

Small smile crinkles his eyes. See my face reflected there and half-surprised to see it doing the same thing.

We could be twins, us. Equally aged to bone-white fur and scarred skin. Holding mirrors up to one another.

 _Honestly._ Paul speaks low. Just a rumble through my ears.

One word. And it resonates through my mind and kind of.

Kind of warms me.

 _Honestly, I think he would appreciate it. To get a visit from the Alpha… It shows he's still at the top of our list. We haven't forgotten about him. We still care about him. All of that._

 _Think it might interest you to see just how much he would appreciate it,_ I say. And laugh a little.

But Paul. His face does not change. Eyes still fixed on me. Screwed on to me like bolts.

Think about everything Paul has done for me.

Think about this one minute thing.

 _Meet you there,_ I say.

Reaction is immediate. Began to think the ice fur on his face had frozen into place. But it splits as he grins.

 _Warm him up for me,_ I tell him. _And I'll catch up later._

His assent is loud and clear and exuberant.

And then out of the blue he moves towards me. So quick a movement and moment I could have blinked and missed it. Licks the fur beneath my ear and nuzzles me with his snout.

And then he is gone.

Bounds through tree gates. Swing their branches open and shut behind him. So where there was Paul and his frayed fur and butter eyes and wet tongue there is now just a wall of green.

And the whispering in the leaves.

And a gentle pad of airy paws.

And a shadow coming to join mine.

Sam.

Had almost forgotten about him.

Shadow had become just that. Shadow.

 _I thought he would never leave,_ he says.

Turn to look at him.

Is he trying to impersonate Paul? Is he trying to mock me?

Is my mind just regurgitating things I have heard recently?

Brown eyes trying to be warm. Grinning lips trying to be playful.

Feel my skin crawl and my cells unsettle.

Do not believe any of it. Any of this stupid show he is putting on.

He is dead and that is it. He is a ghost I have conjured up to haunt me.

Break into a run.

Guess I am trying to escape.

And effortlessly he follows me.

 _Hey, Leah,_ he says easily. _A hello would be nice._

Shake my head.

Strange thing is. Voice does not sound like it is coming from inside my head. Thought that if I covered my ears it would remain the same volume. But it is not like that. It is coming from a very specific point. Over there.

 _You know, I think he has a crush on you._

Not true.

 _You should nip that in the bud before it gets out of hand, Leah._

Shake my head.

 _I mean, that's what you do, right? Ignore people until they go away. Act like they don't exist until they don't exist. So you can be all alone; just how you like it._

 _Not true not true not true_

Round on him. Four paws shoot out. Plant the ground.

Bare my ugly teeth. Hiss dirty globs of saliva. Shoot from me to him like stars.

But before I can even get started he is scrambling back.

Cowering.

Under a cacophony of _Sorry sorry sorry sorry…_

Imagine how I look. Growling ferociously at an innocent birch.

Fold my paws underneath my body. Legs like pillars to hold me up. And I need them. Because everything is shaking.

Sigh rises from deep down.

Buried pit.

Somewhere I did not know I had.

 _This way,_ I say.

For the second time I am leading him.

Away from the lordly trees and to the cliff edge where we first spoke with one of us dead.

Air is colder here. Because it is new. Not been passed through legions of old trees.

It is easier to breathe.

Close my eyes as wind runs its fingers through my hair. Feel rocks needle the soles of my feet. And wind prises open my eyelids.

Shows me distant skylines.

Black mountains blurred with blue fog.

Pigeon feathers dust the sky right down to the line of the sea. Met by waves reaching up. Black water bleeding into the canvas. So it is not really a clear line at all.

Is it?

Behind me Sam waits.

Pull my clothes on. Straighten up.

"Say what you have to say."

Wind carries my words back to him. Then gently pushes my face around.

He looks so solid now.

Half-naked and nervous before me.

For me.

Sight was pretty familiar a few years ago.

Why is the ghost of him so young and alive?

Does not look like the guy who played Peter with the lost boys. Kinging it over a pack of wolves for his last years.

Looks like the boy who was lost himself. Boy who used to read 'Treasure Island' in bed when he'd had a bad day. When he was feeling sad.

Black hair waves in the sea breeze. Muscles twitch under the sharp flick of the spray.

Catch sight of him straightening up. Puffing out his chest.

(Finding it hard to believe now. That it does not harbour a beating heart).

Half expect him to tap a microphone.

Know what he is thinking –

Now is my chance.

Idiot.

Begins:

"Leah. You –"

Stops.

And then holds an arm up to his eyes. For inspection.

Its hair stands to attention in the sea breeze. Crusts white in the salt.

He looks up at me. Awe and marvel and delight shine his eyes and pull his lips into a barely-believing smile.

"I can feel it," he breathes.

Return his gaze. Steady.

"I think it's the sea," he says. "The sea helps me sense."

Think, what does he want me to say?

So I shrug. Hope it conveys just how much I do not care.

Sam gathers himself.

Begins again:

"I mean. Just. I mean come on, Leah. You're not going crazy."

Breathless laugh.

"I mean… You? Crazy? I mean. I mean that just doesn't make sense. It's totally implausible."

Talking crap:

"I know you're not going crazy. And I know that you know too. I mean you might not think you know it, but you do. It's like you don't know it with your skin, but you know it with your bones. You know I'm not your imagination. You know I'm not an illusion. You know that I'm real!"

Starting to panic:

"But… What you don't seem to grasp is… I mean, that is to say… I mean, if you keep ignoring me, that might not be the case much longer! My… being real, that is. I think… I think my existence depends on your acceptance of it."

Words come faster. Slip into each other. Heartbeat pumps into his voice.

"So if you convince yourself I'm not really here, I'll disappear! I think I can already feel myself slipping away. Please, Leah. I can't go back to that. Stuffed in a dark silent box with only my own thoughts. Nobody to see and nobody to speak to."

Remember the way Sam used to panic. When he was five years younger. Over test results and quotes he had forgotten and overdue coursework. Used to flap his sweaty hands and run them through his hair. Wipe his glasses obsessively on the front of his shirt. Used to tease him.

"Please, Leah. Don't let me go back. I can't bear it. Please don't ignore me."

"Okay, Sam."

Cut in without realising.

Do not think it is me speaking.

Something inside me needs to help him.

Someone.

Someone only my bones remember.

Old patterns I guess.

"Okay, Sam," she assures him. "I can see you. I can hear you."

"Please don't ignore me anymore," he begs.

Teardrops hug strands of his black hair. Wet the rock and roll into the sea.

"I won't," she says. "I promise you, I won't."

Listen to his breaths.

In out.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

Okay. That's it.

"I don't know why I'm stuck here _,_ "he says. Voice still a little shaky. "But there must be a reason. I just… I need your help in figuring it out. So I can get out of here."

She speaks.

"But just think about it this way _,_ " is what she says.

Her voice is so young smooth. Weightless. It flies.

Words are slow and soft to soothe him. Keep him calm. Like he is a child.

She frames the next part like an essay title.

"How can someone trust that they are not losing their mind, if the person telling them so is a part of their mind?"

Asking him to use his brain I guess. To construct an argument.

Tentatively he nods.

Looks about him. Raises his nose. Like the wolf inside him is sniffing for an answer.

Head falls. He points.

Follow the line of his arm.

Nestled in dead vines is a rotten log. Like an amputated limb. Faintly red under its mouldy bandages.

"If you look under that log, you'll see a pile of lighters."

Why not.

Its skin is wet and weak under my hands. Uproot the dead vines as I roll the log over.

Sure enough. Unearth a lighter graveyard. Mud is littered with their multi-coloured bodies.

"They belong to Paul."

Voice sounds right next to me. Feel the ghost of his breath on the nape of my neck. Where I have felt it a million times before.

"Do not sneak up on me!"

"Sorry,"Sam replies. Takes a step back.

Some of the flame makers crawl out of the damp earth. Some lie prone on top of it.

Thinking there is maybe something bigger going on here. Something ancient.

"Every time he bought a new one I would steal it and hide it up here. Drove him crazy. Figured I would just annoy the hell out of him until he gave in and kicked the habit. And it actually worked."

Sam never understood the meaning of giving people space.

Rack my brains. Scrabble through my subconscious. Looking for déjà vu. Looking for a sign I knew about these lighters before.

She speaks.

To me.

Logically. Clearly. Confidently.

 _That log was overgrown with creepers. Had not been touched in years. You had no idea these lighters were here and you know it._

Something bigger. Something ancient.

"You can ask Paul _,_ "says Sam. "He'll tell you."

Sam's voice, still so piercing. But mine comes from far away.

"I will _,_ "it says.

Maybe later I will wake up.

"Your mind is just too strong for that kind of thing, Leah."

Soothing.

Soft.

And

And you know what –

Shut the fuck up.

Something snaps inside me and I am back where I am.

I am here.

Feel the breeze coming from the sea. Feel the strength of the stone seep into my legs. Feel myself sink into it.

Feel anger.

"Is that what you would tell Embry and Jacob? That their minds just were not strong enough?"

Sam's two eyes, one mouth, round coins of surprise.

Go on. "'Because me, I just blame you, Sam."

Sam glides back.

That is what I notice. Does not stumble. Does not trip.

Glides.

"Is that what you would tell Quil? Was he not strong enough?"

Sam still backing up. Seems so afraid.

"Tell you something. Do not see Quil hanging around here moaning about being unable to move on."

Look at his body. Wavers like air rising from hot earth. Clouds drift over his skin. Blur its lines and textures. Until his eyes are set in shadow.

Scared eyes.

Brown eyes.

"You fucked us all over. And then you march back in here and demand I help you? Well. That is not likely, Sam Uley. My pack is only just recovering from the damage you did."

Damage.

And before I can stop him Seth is in my mind. Before I can stop him he knocks down the walls.

Parades in front of me. And Sam.

Seth. Passed out in our front garden. Seth. Trying to tiptoe in at six in the morning after no word for four days. Falling. His knee-bones knocking together and clattering to the floor. Me, jolting awake and running out to the hall to help him.

Emptiness he leaves behind. Emptiness he cannot fill when he comes home.

Eyes fixed on a bowl of cereal. Swivelling up to meet mine.

Met with glass. Dull deadened glass.

Find myself close to the edge. Faces of the waves stare up at me blank as my brother's.

Sam has dissolved into a low black fog. Hiding under the tree roots on the threshold of the forest.

Air is so fresh out of the forest. Salt sharp on my nose and tongue.

"Wish Quil was here," I sulk. "Would be better company."

Sam's voice sounds from the rocks and leaves. From the earth. And the waves all that way down below. And breathes down from the sky on the wind.

 _I know._

Watch my paws push a handful of stones to their deaths.

No.

Not their deaths.

To other lives.

At the bottom of the sea. Maybe.

Or on another shore.

Breathe in.

Fresh air.

Takes a few breaths. But then I feel okay.

And then I feel something else.

Sam. Behind me. Creeping out from those tree roots and the cobwebs strung between them. Feel his shadow. Curling into corporeality.

Makes me shudder.

Speaks. And

And it is just Sam. Voice, coming from one place. Like before.

A centred point. Behind me.

Says my name. Just that.

Huff and turn to the West. Steel clouds. Churning machinery of an ocean. Hard to tell what is sea and what is sky when everything is so grey.

"Newsflash, Sam. I am busy. And yes, that is your fault too. So excuse me. Do not really have time for your problems right now."

Proud to say my voice is coming from me. From a deep canal in my chest and from nowhere else. Nobody else.

Hear his voice. Beaded with tears.

"I didn't know, Leah," he says. "About Seth. I'm so sorry."

"Oh, fantastic," I say.

Me? I am not crying.

Repeat. "Fantastic. You're sorry. Well, that is just fantastic."

Drops of salt water rise from the sea and catch my tears.

So I was never crying.

Promise.

But if I stay like this. (Sam behind me. Turned so I cannot see him. Hearing the voice he spoke with when he was still at school and most he worried about was something I had made him think he'd done wrong, or something Mr Krebs said, or my kid brother's grades). It could be us.

Years ago. When Sam was always apologising over some stupid minuscule thing.

And I can pretend.

Can pretend that later I will tell him everything is okay. And believe it under the blankets of my bed and under the shelter of his arms. Smelling the sweet sweaty smell at the roots of his throat. Where my breath tickles him.

And know that everything waiting for us is clean and fresh and whole.

"I didn't know," he says again. "I'm sorry."

Eyelids drift together. Current of the breeze inhales and exhales.

Wish he would just shut up.

* * *

 _A common greyness silvers everything,—_

 _All in a twilight, you and I alike_

— _You, at the point of your first pride in me_

 _(That's gone you know),—but I, at every point;_

 _My youth, my hope, my art, being all toned down_

 _To yonder sober pleasant Fiesole._

 _There's the bell clinking from the chapel-top;_

 _That length of convent-wall across the way_

 _Holds the trees safer, huddled more inside;_

 _The last monk leaves the garden; days decrease,_

 _And autumn grows, autumn in everything._

' _Andrea del Sarto: the Flawless Painter,' Robert Browning_

* * *

 _A/N: Longest chapter yet? It took me bloody ages to get this all edited and there are bound to still be several mistakes. Hey, we get past it._


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